Greedy Algorithm - Assign Cookies
Assume you are an awesome parent and want to give your children some cookies. But, you should give each child at most one cookie.
Each child i
has a greed factor g[i]
, which is the minimum size of a cookie that the child will be content with; and each cookie j
has a size s[j]
. If s[j] >= g[i]
, we can assign the cookie j
to the child i
, and the child i
will be content. Your goal is to maximise the number of your content children and output the maximum number.
Example 1:
Input: g = [1,2,3], s = [1,1]
Output: 1
Explanation: You have 3 children and 2 cookies. The greed factors of 3 children are 1, 2, 3.
And even though you have 2 cookies, since their size is both 1, you could only make the child whose greed factor is 1 content.
You need to output 1.
Example 2:
Input: g = [1,2], s = [1,2,3]
Output: 2
Explanation: You have 2 children and 3 cookies. The greed factors of 2 children are 1, 2.
You have 3 cookies and their sizes are big enough to gratify all of the children,
You need to output 2.
Solution:
/**
* @param {number[]} g - Greed factors of children
* @param {number[]} s - Sizes of cookies
* @return {number} - Maximum number of content children
*/
var findContentChildren = function(g, s) {
// Sort greed factors and cookie sizes
g.sort((a, b) => a - b);
s.sort((a, b) => a - b);
// Initialize indices for greed factors and cookie sizes
let i = 0; // Index for greed factors
let j = 0; // Index for cookie sizes
// Iterate over both arrays
while (i < g.length && j < s.length) {
if (s[j] >= g[i]) { // If the cookie can satisfy the child
i++; // Move to the next child
}
j++; // Move to the next cookie
}
return i; // The number of content children
};
Time Complexity: O(N log N + M log M + M) - 2 sort functions and a while loop
Space Complexity: O(1) because we are not occupying and auxiliary space
Note: Try to greedily assign the smallest possible value to maximise the output.
Hope this helps!