Greedy on string
Last updated: February 23, 2026
Quick Overview
Given a string consisting of lowercase letters, your task is to determine the maximum length of a substring that can be formed by removing at most one character such that the remaining characters are all the same. Return the length of this longest possible substring. For example, given the input "aabbaa", the output should be 5, as removing one 'b' results in "aaaa".
Jump Trading
February 23, 20268
16
2,153 solved
Given a string consisting of lowercase letters, your task is to determine the maximum length of a substring that can be formed by removing at most one character such that the remaining characters are all the same. Return the length of this longest possible substring. For example, given the input "aabbaa", the output should be 5, as removing one 'b' results in "aaaa".
Coding interviews at Jump Trading focus on problem-solving approach as much as the final solution. The interviewer wants to see you break down the problem, consider edge cases, and optimize iteratively. Communication throughout the process is key.
What the Interviewer Expects
- Identify the correct data structure and algorithm for the problem
- Write clean, bug-free code with proper variable naming
- Analyze time and space complexity correctly
- Handle basic edge cases (empty input, single element)
- Communicate your thought process while coding
Key Topics to Cover
How to Approach This
- Clarify input constraints and edge cases before writing code.
- Walk through your approach verbally and confirm with the interviewer before coding.
- Start with a brute force solution, then optimize. Mention time and space complexity.
- Test your solution with examples, including edge cases like empty input or duplicates.
- Consider common patterns: sliding window, two pointers, hash map, BFS/DFS, dynamic programming.
Possible Follow-up Questions
- How would you parallelize this solution?
- What happens if the input contains duplicates?
- What if the input doesn't fit in memory?
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Practice DSA ProblemsSample Answer
Problem Analysis
To solve this problem, we can identify that the main goal is to find the longest substring of identical characters after potentially removing one character. The pattern that applies here is a combinat...
Approach
- Initialize a variable
max_lengthto keep track of the maximum length of the substring found. - Traverse the string to identify segments of contiguous characters. For example, in
aabbaa, we ca...
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