Check if two strings have a common substring

Difficulty Level : Easy
Last Updated : 30 Apr, 2021

You are given two strings str1 and str2. You have to check if the two strings share a common substring.
Examples :

Input : str1 = "HELLO"
        str2 = "WORLD"
Output : YES
Explanation :  The substrings "O" and
"L" are common to both str1 and str2

Input : str1 = "HI"
        str2 = "ALL"
Output : NO
Explanation : Because str1 and str2 
have no common substrings

A basic approach runs in O(n^2), where we compare every character of string 1 with every character of string 2 and replace every matched character with a “_” and set flag variable as true.
An efficient approach works in O(n). We basically need to check if there is a common character or not. We create a vector of size 26 for alphabets and initialize them as 0. For every character in string 1 we increment vector index of that character eg: v[s1[i]-‘a’]++, for every character of string 2 we check vector for the common characters if v[s2[i]-‘a’] > 0 then set flag = true and v[s2[i]-‘a’]– such that one character of string 2 is compared with only one character of string 1.

C++

// CPP program to heck if two strings have
// common substring
#include <bits/stdc++.h>
using namespace std;
 
const int MAX_CHAR = 26;
 
// function to return true if strings have
// common substring and no if strings have
// no common substring
bool twoStrings(string s1, string s2) {
 
  // vector for storing character occurrences
  vector<bool> v(MAX_CHAR, 0);
 
  // increment vector index for every
  // character of str1
  for (int i = 0; i < s1.length(); i++)
    v[s1[i] - 'a'] = true;
 
  // checking common substring of str2 in str1
  for (int i = 0; i < s2.length(); i++)
    if (v[s2[i] - 'a'])
       return true;
  
  return false;       
}
 
// driver program
int main() {
  string str1 = "hello";
  string str2 = "world";
  if (twoStrings(str1, str2))
     cout << "Yes";
  else
     cout << "No";
  return 0;
}

Java

// Java program to check if two strings have
// common substring
import java.util.Arrays;
 
class GFG
{
    static int MAX_CHAR = 26;
     
    // function to return true if strings have
    // common substring and no if strings have
    // no common substring
    static boolean twoStrings(String s1, String s2)
    {
        // vector for storing character occurrences
        boolean v[]=new boolean[MAX_CHAR];
        Arrays.fill(v,false);
     
        // increment vector index for every
        // character of str1
        for (int i = 0; i < s1.length(); i++)
            v[s1.charAt(i) - 'a'] = true;
         
        // checking common substring of str2 in str1
        for (int i = 0; i < s2.length(); i++)
            if (v[s2.charAt(i) - 'a'])
            return true;
         
        return false;    
    }
     
    // Driver code
    public static void main (String[] args)
    {
        String str1 = "hello";
        String str2 = "world";
        if (twoStrings(str1, str2))
            System.out.print("Yes");
        else
            System.out.print("No");
    }
}
 
// This code is contributed by Anant Agarwal.

Python 3


# Python 3 program to heck if two 
# strings have common substring
MAX_CHAR = 26

# function to return true if 
# strings have common substring 
# and no if strings have no
# common substring
def twoStrings(s1, s2) :

    # vector for storing character
    # occurrences
    v = [0] * (MAX_CHAR)
    
    # increment vector index for every
    # character of str1
    for i in range(len(s1)):
        v[ord(s1[i]) - ord('a')] = True
    
    # checking common substring 
    # of str2 in str1
    for i in range(len(s2)) :
        if (v[ord(s2[i]) - ord('a')]) :
            return True
    
    return False

# Driver Code
if __name__ == "__main__":
    str1 = "hello"
    str2 = "world"
    if (twoStrings(str1, str2)):
        print("Yes")
    else:
        print("No")

# This code is contributed 
# by ChitraNayal

C#

// C# program to check if two
// strings have common substring
using System;
 
class GFG
{
    static int MAX_CHAR = 26;
     
    // function to return true if strings have
    // common substring and no if strings have
    // no common substring
    static bool twoStrings(String s1, String s2)
    {
        // vector for storing character occurrences
        bool []v = new bool[MAX_CHAR];
         
    // Arrays.fill(v,false);
    for(int i = 0; i < MAX_CHAR; i++)
    v[i]=false;
     
        // increment vector index for
        // every character of str1
        for (int i = 0; i < s1.Length; i++)
            v[s1[i] - 'a'] = true;
         
        // checking common substring of str2 in str1
        for (int i = 0; i < s2.Length; i++)
            if (v[s2[i] - 'a'])
            return true;
         
        return false;    
    }
     
    // Driver code
    public static void Main ()
    {
        String str1 = "hello";
        String str2 = "world";
        if (twoStrings(str1, str2))
            Console.Write("Yes");
        else
            Console.Write("No");
    }
}
 
// This code is contributed by nitin mittal.

Javascript

<script>
 
// javascript program to heck if two strings have
// common substring
 
var MAX_CHAR = 26;
 
// function to return true if strings have
// common substring and no if strings have
// no common substring
function twoStrings(s1, s2) {
 
  // vector for storing character occurrences
  var v = Array(MAX_CHAR).fill(0);
 
  // increment vector index for every
  // character of str1
  for (var i = 0; i < s1.length; i++)
    v[s1[i] - 'a'] = true;
 
  // checking common substring of str2 in str1
  for (var i = 0; i < s2.length; i++)
    if (v[s2[i] - 'a'])
       return true;
  
  return false;       
}
 
// driver program
var str1 = "hello";
var str2 = "world";
if (twoStrings(str1, str2))
   document.write( "Yes");
else
   document.write("No");
 
// This code is contributed by rutvik_56.
</script>

Output :

Yes

Time Complexity : O(n)

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