Is Determine if Two Events Have Conflict easy or hard?

Determine if Two Events Have Conflict is categorized as an Easy problem. The challenge focuses on recognizing the interval overlap rule and implementing simple comparisons rather than complex algorithms or data structures.

Determine if Two Events Have Conflict Python/Java solution

Python and Java implementations typically follow the same logic: either convert HH:MM strings into minutes using parsing or directly compare the strings. After conversion or comparison, apply the interval overlap condition to determine whether the events conflict.

How to solve Determine if Two Events Have Conflict in O(1)?

Convert each HH:MM timestamp into minutes from midnight or compare the strings directly. After that, apply the interval overlap rule: if event1.start ≤ event2.end and event2.start ≤ event1.end, the events conflict. Because only four timestamps are processed, the solution runs in constant time.

What is the best approach for Determine if Two Events Have Conflict?

The best approach checks interval overlap using the condition start1 ≤ end2 and start2 ≤ end1. You can either convert times to total minutes or compare the HH:MM strings directly. Both approaches run in O(1) time and O(1) space because the input size is fixed.

Is Determine if Two Events Have Conflict asked at Google/Amazon/Meta?

Interval overlap and time comparison problems frequently appear in interviews at companies like Amazon, Google, and Meta. While this exact problem may vary, the core concept of checking overlapping intervals is a common interview pattern.

What data structure is used in Determine if Two Events Have Conflict?

The problem mainly uses arrays to store start and end times and simple string manipulation for parsing. No advanced data structures are required, making it a straightforward interval comparison task.

What is the time complexity of Determine if Two Events Have Conflict?

The time complexity is O(1). The problem only involves comparing two intervals with a fixed number of timestamps, so the number of operations does not grow with input size. Space complexity is also O(1).

Description Hints 2 Solution Video 7:53

2446. Determine if Two Events Have Conflict

Easy53.7% acceptance2 companies

You are given two arrays of strings that represent two inclusive events that happened on the same day, event1 and event2, where:

event1 = [startTime₁, endTime₁] and
event2 = [startTime₂, endTime₂].

Event times are valid 24 hours format in the form of HH:MM.

A conflict happens when two events have some non-empty intersection (i.e., some moment is common to both events).

Return true if there is a conflict between two events. Otherwise, return false.

Example 1:

Input: event1 = ["01:15","02:00"], event2 = ["02:00","03:00"]
Output: true
Explanation: The two events intersect at time 2:00.

Example 2:

Input: event1 = ["01:00","02:00"], event2 = ["01:20","03:00"]
Output: true
Explanation: The two events intersect starting from 01:20 to 02:00.

Example 3:

Input: event1 = ["10:00","11:00"], event2 = ["14:00","15:00"]
Output: false
Explanation: The two events do not intersect.

Constraints:

event1.length == event2.length == 2
event1[i].length == event2[i].length == 5
startTime₁ <= endTime₁
startTime₂ <= endTime₂
All the event times follow the HH:MM format.

Asked at 2 companies

Goldman Sachs

Google

Topics

Array String

Hints open one at a time

Hint 1

Parse time format to some integer interval first

Hint 2

How would you determine if two intervals overlap?

7:53

Still stuck?Read 3 approaches, or watch a walkthrough.

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