This notebook was prepared by Donne Martin. Source and license info is on GitHub.

Solution Notebook¶

Problem: Given an array of (unix_timestamp, num_people, EventType.ENTER or EventType.EXIT), find the busiest period.¶

Constraints¶

Can we assume the input array is valid?
- Check for None
Can we assume the elements of the input array are valid?
- Yes
Is the input sorted by time?
- No
Can you have enter and exit elements for the same timestamp?
- Yes you can, order of enter and exit is not guaranteed
Could we have multiple enter events (or multiple exit events) for the same timestamp?
- No
What is the format of the output?
- An array of timestamps [t1, t2]
Can we assume the starting number of people is zero?
- Yes
Can we assume the inputs are valid?
- No
Can we assume this fits memory?
- Yes

Test Cases¶

None -> TypeError
[] -> None
General case

timestamp  num_people  event_type
3          2           EventType.EXIT
1          2           EventType.ENTER
3          1           EventType.ENTER
7          3           EventType.ENTER
9          2           EventType.EXIT
8          2           EventType.EXIT

result = Period(7, 8)

Algorithm¶

Since the input is not sorted, we'll need to sort it first by timestamp, ascending.

For each interval in the data set:

If this is an "enter" event, increment curr_people, else, decrement
Since we can have an "enter" and "exit" event for the same timestamp, we'll need to look ahead one
- If the next element has the same timestamp, hold off (continue) on updating max_people and max_period
- Watch out for indexing out-of-bounds at the end of the array
Update max_people and max_period

Sorted:

timestamp  num_people  event_type       curr_people  max_people       max_period
1          2           EventType.ENTER  2            2                [1, 3]
3          1           EventType.ENTER  3            2 (not updated)  [1, 3]
3          2           EventType.EXIT   1            2                [3, 7]
7          3           EventType.ENTER  4            4                [7, 8]
8          2           EventType.EXIT   2            4                [7, 8]
9          2           EventType.EXIT   0            4                [7, 8]

Complexity:

Time: O(nlog(n)) for the sort
Space: O(1), assuming the sort is in-place

Code¶

In [1]:

from enum import Enum


class Data(object):

    def __init__(self, timestamp, num_people, event_type):
        self.timestamp = timestamp
        self.num_people = num_people
        self.event_type = event_type

    def __lt__(self, other):
        return self.timestamp < other.timestamp


class Period(object):

    def __init__(self, start, end):
        self.start = start
        self.end = end

    def __eq__(self, other):
        return self.start == other.start and self.end == other.end

    def __repr__(self):
        return str(self.start) + ', ' + str(self.end)


class EventType(Enum):

    ENTER = 0
    EXIT = 1

In [2]:

class Solution(object):

    def find_busiest_period(self, data):
        if data is None:
            raise TypeError('data cannot be None')
        if not data:
            return None
        data.sort()
        max_period = Period(0, 0)
        max_people = 0
        curr_people = 0
        for index, interval in enumerate(data):
            if interval.event_type == EventType.ENTER:
                curr_people += interval.num_people
            elif interval.event_type == EventType.EXIT:
                curr_people -= interval.num_people
            else:
                raise ValueError('Invalid event type')
            if (index < len(data) - 1 and 
                    data[index].timestamp == data[index + 1].timestamp):
                continue
            if curr_people > max_people:
                max_people = curr_people
                max_period.start = data[index].timestamp
                if index < len(data) - 1:
                    max_period.end = data[index + 1].timestamp
                else:
                    max_period.end = data[index].timestamp
        return max_period

Unit Test¶

In [3]:

%%writefile test_find_busiest_period.py
import unittest


class TestSolution(unittest.TestCase):

    def test_find_busiest_period(self):
        solution = Solution()
        self.assertRaises(TypeError, solution.find_busiest_period, None)
        self.assertEqual(solution.find_busiest_period([]), None)
        data = [
            Data(3, 2, EventType.EXIT),
            Data(1, 2, EventType.ENTER),
            Data(3, 1, EventType.ENTER),
            Data(7, 3, EventType.ENTER),
            Data(9, 2, EventType.EXIT),
            Data(8, 2, EventType.EXIT),
        ]
        self.assertEqual(solution.find_busiest_period(data), Period(7, 8))
        print('Success: test_find_busiest_period')


def main():
    test = TestSolution()
    test.test_find_busiest_period()


if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

Overwriting test_find_busiest_period.py

In [4]:

%run -i test_find_busiest_period.py

Success: test_find_busiest_period