I am unable to solve many easy questions (Longest harmonious subsequence is one such example). I want to know if the LC questions are tagged correctly or if I need to go back to the basics (like an online course) before I move ahead with LC. I have started questioning if LC is going to help me forward since I am mostly looking up solutions or checking out YouTube videos to understand the solutions.
I think for the most part yes, although you can argue a few easies are medium and a few medium are easy. I haven't seen any incorrectly classified hard.
I see. Thanks. I'll probably take up a basic course then.
When I first started doing LC I had a much easier time doing the hard and mediums than the easies for some reason. I think maybe it's because I was doing them in Java and know that sdk like the back of my hand so many of the mediums or hards I could just use existing stuff to do, but it's hard to say. With practice it's possible to do just about any of them but I think it's entirely possible that for some people the hards are easy and the easy are hard
Many questions do not have the correct difficulty tag. For example, merge K sorted lists should be medium (currently hard). Needle in haystack should be medium (currently easy). Find and replace word should be medium (currently easy).
Thanks. What do you suggest I do? Keep at LC or go for something more basic? Will that help, since courses and books teach more theory?
My advice is to put in more hours, spend your time reading books or doing leetcode, there is no fast way to learn the concepts. When you get stuck spend some time learning the concepts, then keep moving. Also remember leetcode is the shortcut. Leetcode is 100% optional to pass FAANG interviews if you are strong on your fundamentals.
My job desc doesn't list programming but if I can't envision 2 or more ways to solve a problem I just go to the next one because it means I'm not ready for it If I do learn something new while struggling to implement what I envisioned, I go back and solve past solutions. Most of mine are currently >90% faster/80% more memory efficient than the other submissions and I have a few that are at 100% now. Mostly easy/medium though since I started a month ago I honestly think looking at somebody else's solution would mean I hadn't learned anything. Maybe I'd learn some sort of trick but if I wasnt dedicating time to really understanding how/why it's better but actually digging through the documentation on each language and reading it and playing with it's been rewarding and appears to be working for me
994. Rotting Oranges is tagged as easy. U tell me if that should be considered easy.
That's a pretty straightforward question.. so not sure what you mean here. I think it should be tagged as easy, or at most medium due to length
But even number of islands is tagged as medium. I'd say this is just a tad step above that
TC?