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Two words w1 and w2 are similar if and only if w1 == w2, (w1, w2) was a pair, or (w2, w1) was a pair.
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Yes, problems like Sentence Similarity are common in technical interviews because they test understanding of hash tables, string comparison, and edge case handling. Variants such as Sentence Similarity II may also introduce graph or union-find concepts.
A HashSet or HashMap is ideal because it provides O(1) average lookup time. By storing pairs of similar words, you can quickly determine if two words are considered similar while iterating through the sentences.
The optimal approach uses a hash-based structure like a HashSet or HashMap to store all similar word pairs. Then, iterate through both sentences and verify whether each pair of words is either identical or present in the similarity structure. This allows constant-time similarity checks.
No. Two words are considered similar if they are either exactly the same or appear as a pair in the provided similarity list. The similarity relationship is symmetric but not necessarily transitive in this problem.