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How to efficiently remove consecutive same characters in a string

I wrote a method to reduce a sequence of the same characters to a single character as follows. It seems its logic is correct while there is a room for improvement in terms of performance, according to my tutor. Could anyone shed some light on this?
Comments of aspects other than performance is also really appreciated.
public class RemoveRepetitions {
public static String remove(String input) {
String ret = "";
String last = "";
String[] stringArray = input.split("");
for(int j=0; j < stringArray.length; j++) {
if (! last.equals(stringArray[j]) ) {
ret += stringArray[j];
}
last = stringArray[j];
}
return ret;
}
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println(RemoveRepetitions.remove("foobaarrbuzz"));
}
}

We can improve the performance by using StringBuilder instead of using string as string operations are costlier. Also, the split function is also not required (it will make the program slower as well).
Here is a way to solve this:
public static String remove(String input)
{
StringBuilder answer = new StringBuilder("");
int N = input.length();
int i = 0;
while (i < N)
{
char c = input.charAt(i);
answer.append( c );
while (i<N && input.charAt(i)==c)
++i;
}
return answer.toString();
}
The idea is to iterate over all characters of the input string and keep appending every new character to the answer and skip all the same consecutive characters.

Possible change which you could think of in your code is:
Time Complexity: Your code is achieving output in O(n) time complexity, which might be the best possible way.
Space Complexity: Your code is using extra memory space which arises due to splitting.
Question to ask: Can you achieve this output, without using the extra space for character array that you get after splitting the string? (as character by character traversal is possible directly on string).
I can provide you the code here but, it would be great if you could try it on your own, once you are done with your attempts
you can lookup for the best solution here (you are almost there)
https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/remove-consecutive-duplicates-string/
Good luck!

As mentioned before, it is much better to access the characters in the string using method String::charAt or at least by iterating a char array retrieved with String::toCharArray instead of splitting the input string into String array.
However, Java strings may contain characters exceeding basic multilingual plane of Unicode (e.g. emojis 😂😍😊, Chinese or Japanese characters etc.) and therefore String::codePointAt should be used. Respectively, Character.charCount should be used to calculate appropriate offset while iterating the input string.
Also the input string should be checked if it's null or empty, so the resulting code may look like this:
public static String dedup(String str) {
if (null == str || str.isEmpty()) {
return str;
}
int prev = -1;
int n = str.length();
System.out.println("length = " + n + " of [" + str + "], real length: " + str.codePointCount(0, n));
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder(n);
for (int i = 0; i < n; ) {
int cp = str.codePointAt(i);
if (i == 0 || cp != prev) {
sb.appendCodePoint(cp);
}
prev = cp;
i += Character.charCount(cp); // for emojis it returns 2
}
return sb.toString();
}
A version with String::charAt may look like this:
public static String dedup2(String str) {
if (null == str || str.isEmpty()) {
return str;
}
int n = str.length();
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder(n);
sb.append(str.charAt(0));
for (int i = 1; i < n; i++) {
if (str.charAt(i) != str.charAt(i - 1)) {
sb.append(str.charAt(i));
}
}
return sb.toString();
}
The following test proves that charAt fails to deduplicate repeated emojis:
System.out.println("codePoint: " + dedup ("😂😂😍😍😊😊😂 hello"));
System.out.println("charAt: " + dedup2("😂😂😍😍😊😊😂 hello"));
Output:
length = 20 of [😂😂😍😍😊😊😂 hello], real length: 13
codePoint: 😂😍😊😂 helo
charAt: 😂😂😍😍😊😊😂 helo

How to insert a char before each char in a string, but not before 'space' in Java?

This is what I got. It works for now, but if I type, for example, "I like bananas", I get 'pIp ppipkpep pbpapnpapnpaps', while I'm aiming to get 'pI pLpipkpe pbpapnpapnpaps.
Every solution I tried came down to using an 'if statement', trying to check if the character at said position in the original 'encText'is equal to ' ', and if so, making it equal to ' ' as well in the newText array before checking if the position required an 'p' or the char from the original array.. However, everytime I tried that, I'd get an array out of bounds exception.
static void pEncrypt() {
System.out.println("Adding P");
Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
String encText = in.nextLine();
int k = encText.length();
char[] charsEncText = encText.toCharArray();
char[] newText = new char[2*k];
int j = 1;
for (int i = 0; i < (k*2); i++) {
if (i%2 == 0) {
newText[i] = 'p';
} else {
newText[i] = charsEncText[i-j];
j++;
}
}
System.out.println(newText);
}

A simpler solution is to use replaceAll with a positive lookahead.
String str = "I like bananas";
String res = str.replaceAll("(?=[^ ])", "p");
System.out.println(res); // "pI plpipkpe pbpapnpapnpaps"
Demo

You can try this way.
static void pEncrypt() {
System.out.println("Adding P");
Scanner in = new Scanner(System.in);
String encText = in.nextLine();
int k = encText.length();
char[] charsEncText = encText.toCharArray();
char[] newText = new char[2*k];
int j=0;
for(int i=0;i<k;i++)
{
if(charsEncText[i]==' ')
{
newText[j]=charsEncText[i];
j++;
}
else{
newText[j]='p';
newText[j+1]=charsEncText[i];
j=j+2;
}
}
System.out.println(newText);
}

Assuming one does not need a char[], I would just concatenate to a String. Something like:
public static String pEncrypt(String org)
{
String ret = "";
for (int i = 0; i < org.length(); ++i) {
char ch = org.charAt(i);
if (ch != ' ') {
ret += "p" + ch;
}
else {
ret += ' ';
}
}
return ret;
}
Also, to make things a bit easier, it is generally a good idea to separate the I/O (i.e., the Scanner and the println) from the processing. That way, one can write test cases rather than attempting to keep inputting the information.
Sample Output:
helloworld ==> phpeplplpopwpoprplpd
I like bananas ==> pI plpipkpe pbpapnpapnpaps

Add Something to Char Array at Specific Spot (Java)

I am tasked with taking a user sentence then separating it at the upper case letters as well as making those letters lower case after adding a " ".
I want to add a space add that position so that if user inputs "HappyDaysToCome" will output "Happy days to come".
Current code
public static void main(String[] args)
{
Scanner s = new Scanner(System.in);
System.out.println("Please enter a sentence");
String sentenceString = s.nextLine();
char[] sentenceArray = sentenceString.toCharArray();
for(int i = 0; i < sentenceArray.length; i++)
{
if(i!=0 && Character.isUpperCase(sentenceArray[i]))
{
Character.toLowerCase(sentenceArray[i]);
sentenceArray.add(i, ' ');
}
}
System.out.println(sentenceArray)
s.close();
}
}

There is no add method for arrays. Arrays are not resizeable. If you indeed want to use a char[] array, you need to allocate one that is large enough, e.g. by counting the uppercase letters or simply by allocating a array that is surely large enough (twice the String length minus 1).
String input = ...
String outputString;
if (input.isEmpty()) {
outputString = "";
} else {
char[] output = new char[input.length() * 2 - 1];
output[0] = input.charAt(0);
int outputIndex = 1;
for (int i = 1; i < input.length(); i++, outputIndex++) {
char c = input.charAt(i);
if (Character.isUpperCase(c)) {
output[outputIndex++] = ' ';
output[outputIndex] = Character.toLowerCase(c);
} else {
output[outputIndex] = c;
}
}
outputString = new String(output, 0, outputIndex);
}
System.out.println(outputString);
Or better still use a StringBuilder
String input = ...
String outputString;
if (input.isEmpty()) {
outputString = "";
} else {
StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder().append(input.charAt(0));
for (int i = 1; i < input.length(); i++) {
char c = input.charAt(i);
if (Character.isUpperCase(c)) {
sb.append(' ').append(Character.toLowerCase(c));
} else {
sb.append(c);
}
}
outputString = sb.toString();
}
System.out.println(outputString);

You're approaching this the wrong way. Just add each char back to a new string but with spaces included at the right spots. Don't worry about modifying your char array at all. Here is a slight modification of your code:
public static void main(String[] args)
{
Scanner s = new Scanner(System.in);
System.out.println("Please enter a sentence");
String sentenceString = s.nextLine();
char[] sentenceArray = sentenceString.toCharArray();
//new string to hold the output
//starts with only the first char of the old string
string spacedString = sentenceArray[0] + "";
for(int i = 1; i < sentenceArray.length; i++)
{
if(Character.isUpperCase(sentenceArray[i]))
{
//if we find an upper case char, add a space and the lower case of that char
spacedString = spacedString + " " + Character.toLowerCase(sentenceArray[i]);
}else {
//otherwise just add the char itself
spacedString = spacedString + sentenceArray[i];
}
}
System.out.println(spacedString)
s.close();
}
If you want to optimize performance, you can use a StringBuilder object. However, for spacing out a single sentence, performance isn't going to make any real difference at all. If performance does matter to you, read more on StringBuilder here: https://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/StringBuilder.html

We basically want to tokenize the input string on uppercase letters. This can be done using the regular expression [A-Z][^A-Z]* (i.e., one uppercase, followed by zero or more "not" uppercase). The String class has a built-in split() method that takes a regular expression. Unfortunately, you also want to keep the delimiter (which is the uppercase letter), so that slightly complicates matters, but it can still be done using Pattern and Matcher to put the matched delimiter back into the string:
import java.util.StringTokenizer;
import java.util.regex.Matcher;
import java.util.regex.Pattern;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.ArrayList;
public class Foo {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String text = "ThisIsATest1234ABC";
String regex = "\\p{javaUpperCase}[^\\p{javaUpperCase}]*";
Matcher matcher = Pattern.compile(regex).matcher(text);
StringBuffer buf = new StringBuffer();
List<String> result = new ArrayList<String>();
while(matcher.find()){
matcher.appendReplacement(buf, matcher.group());
result.add(buf.toString());
buf.setLength(0);
}
matcher.appendTail(buf);
result.add(buf.toString());
String resultString = "";
for(String s: result) { resultString += s + " "; }
System.out.println("Final: \"" + resultString.trim() + "\"");
}
}
Output:
Final: "This Is A Test1234 A B C"

Write a method to replace all spaces in a string with '%20'?

I have a question about a programming problem from the book Cracking The Code Interview by Gayl Laakmann McDowell, 5th Edition.
I'm not sure what is wrong with my answer? It varies a lot from the answer given in the book.
public String replace(String str){
String[] words = str.split(" ");
StringBuffer sentence = new StringBuffer();
for(String w: words){
sentence.append("%20");
sentence.append(w);
}
return sentence.toString();
}

Question in the book says:
Note: if implementing in Java, please use a character array so that
you can perform this operation in place.
It also says that the char array that you get as input is long enough to hold the modified string.
By using split and StringBuffer you use additional O(n) space. That's why your answer varies a lot and is incorrect (apart from adding additional "%20").

In this loop, the program adds %20 before each word:
for(String w: words){
sentence.append("%20");
sentence.append(w);
}
That will produce incorrect results, for example for a b it will give %20a%20b.
There's a much simpler solution:
public String replace(String str) {
return str.replaceAll(" ", "%20");
}
Or, if you really don't want to use .replaceAll, then write like this:
public String replace(String str) {
String[] words = str.split(" ");
StringBuilder sentence = new StringBuilder(words[0]);
for (int i = 1; i < words.length; ++i) {
sentence.append("%20");
sentence.append(words[i]);
}
return sentence.toString();
}

You can also do the following, which replaces any space
String s = "Hello this is a string!";
System.out.println(replaceSpace(s, "%20"));
public static String replaceSpace(String s, String replacement) {
String ret = s.replaceAll(" *", replacement);
return ret;
}
Gives
Hello%20this%20is%20a%20string!

One of the simplest way:
public void replaceAll( String str )
{
String temp = str.trim();
char[] arr = temp.toCharArray();
StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
for( int i = 0; i < arr.length; i++ )
{
if( arr[i] == ' ' )
{
sb.append( "%20" );
}
else
{
sb.append( arr[i] );
}
}
}

private static String applyReplaceOperationWithCount(String str) {
if (StringUtils.isEmpty(str)) { //if string is null or empty, return it
return str;
}
char[] strChar = str.toCharArray();
int count = 0; //count spaces in the string to recalculate the array length
for (char c : strChar) {
if (c == ' ') {
count++;
}
}
if (count == 0) { // if there are no spaces in the string, return it
return str;
}
int length = strChar.length;
char[] newChar = new char[length + (count * 2)]; // 1 char will be replaced by 3 chars. So the new length should be count*2 larger than original
int index = 0;
for (char c : strChar) {
if (c != ' ') { // if char is not a space just push it in the next available location
newChar[index++] = c;
} else { // if char is a space just push %,2,0
newChar[index++] = '%';
newChar[index++] = '2';
newChar[index++] = '0';
}
}
return new String(newChar); // convert the new array into string
}

I am using matches and replaceAll it works well.
public class ReplaceSpaces {
public static void main(String[] args) {
String text = " Abcd olmp thv ";
if(text.matches(".*\\s+.*")){
System.out.println("Yes I see white space and I am replacing it");
String newText = text.replaceAll("\\s+", "%20");
System.out.println(newText);
}
else{
System.out.println("Nope I dont see white spaces");
}
}
}
Output
Yes I see white space and I am replacing it
%20Abcd%20olmp%20thv%20

public static String replaceSpaceInString(String string,String toreplace){
String replacedString = "";
if(string.isEmpty()) return string;
string = string.trim();
if(string.indexOf(" ") == -1)return string;
else{
replacedString = string.replaceAll("\\s+",toreplace);
}
return replacedString;
}

Replace " " of a string with "%20" - Complexity issue, which of the two below mentioned should be preferred?

Converting it to char array and then concatenating it back replacing spaces with "%20".
OR
Dividing string into substrings with "white space" as the "separator" and just combining the strings with "%20" between them.
For eg:
Str = "This is John Shaw "
(There are as many extra spaces at the end as there are spaces in the string)
expected outcome:
"This%20is%20John%20Shaw"

Is it not this ?
txt = txt.replaceAll(" ", "%20");
Let me know if I understood it wrong.

By replaceAll method of the String class as follow.
String str = "This is John Shaw ";
str = str.replaceAll(" ", "%20");
Output
This%20is%20John%20Shaw%20

You can write both algorithms with a complexity O(n) where n is the number of characters in the String but there are much better algorithms to do that.
By the way I wrote an example that show you the computing time, one method is faster than the other but they are both, as I said, O(n)
public class ComplexityTester
{
//FIRST METHOD
public static String replaceSpacesArray(String str)
{
str = str.trim(); // leading and trailing whitespaces omitted
char[] charArray = str.toCharArray();
String result = "";
for(int i = 0; i<charArray.length; i++) // it replaces spaces with %20
{
if(charArray[i] == ' ') //it's a space, replace it!
result += "%20";
else //it's not a space, add it!
result += charArray[i];
}
return result;
}
//SECOND METHOD
public static String replaceSpacesWithSubstrings(String str)
{
str = str.trim(); // leading and trailing whitespaces omitted
String[] words = new String[5]; //array of strings, to add substrings
int wordsSize = 0; //strings in the array
//From the string to an array of substrings
//(the words separated by spaces of the string)
int indexFrom = 0;
int indexTo = 1;
while(indexTo<=str.length())
{
if(wordsSize == words.length) //if the array is full, resize it!
words = resize(words);
//we reach the end of the sting, add the last word to the array!
if(indexTo == str.length())
{
words[wordsSize++] = str.substring(indexFrom, indexTo++);
}
else if(str.substring(indexTo-1,indexTo).equals(" "))//it's a space
{
//we add the last word to the array
words[wordsSize++] = str.substring(indexFrom, indexTo-1);
indexFrom = indexTo; //update the indices
indexTo++;
}
else //it's a character not equal to space
{
indexTo++; //update the index
}
}
String result = "";
// From the array to the result string
for(int i = 0; i<wordsSize; i++)
{
result += words[i];
if(i+1!=wordsSize)
result += "%20";
}
return result;
}
private static String[] resize(String[] array)
{
int newLength = array.length*2;
String[] newArray = new String[newLength];
System.arraycopy(array,0,newArray,0,array.length);
return newArray;
}
public static void main(String[] args)
{
String example = "The Java Tutorials are practical guides "
+"for programmers who want to use the Java programming "
+"language to create applications. They include hundreds "
+"of complete, working examples, and dozens of lessons. "
+"Groups of related lessons are organized into \"trails\"";
String testString = "";
for(int i = 0; i<100; i++) //String 'testString' is string 'example' repeted 100 times
{
testString+=example;
}
long time = System.currentTimeMillis();
replaceSpacesArray(testString);
System.out.println("COMPUTING TIME (ARRAY METHOD) = "
+ (System.currentTimeMillis()-time));
time = System.currentTimeMillis();
replaceSpacesWithSubstrings(testString);
System.out.println("COMPUTING TIME (SUBSTRINGS METHOD) = "
+ (System.currentTimeMillis()-time));
}
}