Min Stack
July 27, 2012
Today’s exercise continues our occasional series of exercises based on interview questions:
Design a data structure that provides push and pop operations, like a stack, plus a third operation that finds the minimum element. All three operations must perform in constant time. You may assume that all elements are distinct.
Your task is to write the three indicated functions. When you are finished, you are welcome to read or run a suggested solution, or to post your own solution or discuss the exercise in the comments below.
Programming Praxis 
[…] today’s Programming Praxis exercise, our goal is to create s stack-like data structure that can push, pop […]
My Haskell solution (see http://bonsaicode.wordpress.com/2012/07/27/programming-praxis-min-stack/ for a version with comments):
Javascript. I used a function constructor.
function MinStack() { var pushPopStack= [] , minimumsStack = [] , n = 0 //Num of elems in structure , m = 0;// num of elems in min stack this.push = function (elem) { //If num of elems is zero, push to both stacks. 1st elem //is also a minimum if (n === 0) { minimumsStack.push(elem); m++; } //If new elem is lower than current min, we push a new min else if (elem < minimumsStack[m-1]) { minimumsStack.push(elem); m++; } pushPopStack.push(elem); n++; }; this.pop = function () { if (n === 0) { throw "No elems"; } var elem = pushPopStack.pop(); n--; //If elem matches pop of min stack, pop that one //off too if (elem === minimumsStack[m-1]) { m--; minimumsStack.pop(); } return elem; }; //Return minimun this.min = function () { return minimumsStack[m-1]; }; this.toString = function () { var str = pushPopStack + " | " + minimumsStack; return str; }; } var ms = new MinStack();Python version:
For the push operation, I think you need to add the new item to the min stack if it is returns 0, but also clears a 0 from the minimum stack
minimum –> should still be zero
Sorry, a less than symbol messed up my comment.
I think the push operation needs to add the new item to the minimum stack when it is less than or equal to the current minimum. Otherwise, a minimum item could get popped off to soon. Consider this sequence of operations:
The problem text states that all items are distinct.
Mike, pushing 3 onto the stack twice is actually not legal according the specification: “You may assume that all elements are distinct”.
Clojure solution almost similar to the Haskell one
(defn empty' [] (vector '() '())) (defn min' [[_ mins]] (first mins)) (defn peek' [[stack _]] (first stack)) (defn push' [[stack mins] x] (vector (conj stack x) (if (and (seq mins) (> x (first mins))) mins (conj mins x)))) (defn pop' [[stack mins]] (vector (rest stack) (if (not= (first stack) (first mins)) mins (rest mins))))Alternate solution, using protocol and an helper constructor
(defprotocol IMinStack (min' [this]) (peek' [this]) (push' [this e]) (pop' [this])) (defrecord MinStack [_stack _mins] IMinStack (min' [this] (first _mins)) (peek' [this] (first _stack)) (push' [this e] (MinStack. (conj _stack e) (if (and (seq _mins) (> e (first _mins))) _mins (conj _mins e)))) (pop' [this] (MinStack. (rest _stack) (if (not= (first _stack) (first _mins)) _mins (rest _mins))))) (defn empty' [] (MinStack. '() '()))Whatever the solution you can use it the same way
A Go solution similar to the Python one:
package main import "fmt" type MinStack struct { stack []int mins []int } func NewMinStack() *MinStack { return &MinStack{make([]int, 0), make([]int, 0)} } func (st *MinStack) String() string { if st.Empty() { return "empty stack" } return fmt.Sprintf("top=%d min=%d", st.Top(), st.Min()) } func (st *MinStack) Empty() bool { return len(st.stack) == 0 } func (st *MinStack) Push(n int) { st.stack = append(st.stack, n) if len(st.mins) == 0 || n <= st.mins[len(st.mins)-1] { st.mins = append(st.mins, n) } } func (st *MinStack) Top() int { if st.Empty() { panic("empty stack") } return st.stack[len(st.stack)-1] } func (st *MinStack) Pop() int { if st.Empty() { panic("empty stack") } n := st.stack[len(st.stack)-1] st.stack = st.stack[0 : len(st.stack)-1] if n == st.mins[len(st.mins)-1] { st.mins = st.mins[0 : len(st.mins)-1] } return n } func (st *MinStack) Min() int { if st.Empty() { panic("empty stack") } return st.mins[len(st.mins)-1] } func main() { st := NewMinStack() st.Push(3) st.Push(4) st.Push(5) fmt.Println(st) st.Push(1) st.Push(2) fmt.Println(st) st.Pop() st.Pop() fmt.Println(st) }Learning a bit of c++:
#ifndef CSTACK_H
#define CSTACK_H
using namespace std;
struct node {
int x;
node *next;
};
class CStack {
public:
CStack();
CStack(const CStack& orig);
virtual ~CStack();
void push(int x);
int pop();
int minimum();
private:
int min;
node *head;
};
#endif /* CSTACK_H */
#include “CStack.h”
#include
#include
using namespace std;
CStack::CStack() {
min=1000;
}
CStack::CStack(const CStack& orig) {
}
CStack::~CStack() {
}
int CStack::minimum() {
return min;
}
void CStack::push(int x) {
node *current;
if(head != NULL){
current = new node;
current->x=x;
if(min>x){
min=x;
}
current->next=head;
head=current;
}
else{
head = new node;
min=x;
head->x=x;
}
}
int CStack::pop() {
int ret = head->x;
head=head->next;
return ret;
}
[…] Pages: 1 2 […]
Perl6 version:
class Min_stack { has @.stack; has @.min; method push($item) { push @.stack, $item; if @.min==0 or @.min[*-1] > $item { push @.min, $item; } } method pop() { my $item=pop @.stack; if $item == @.min[*-1] { pop @.min; } return $item; } method min() { @.min[*-1]; } }[…] problem: Min Stack Design a data structure that provides push and pop operations, like a stack, plus a third operation […]
should rename the method name as http://swuecho.wordpress.com/2012/08/04/min-stack/, because of names conflict.