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Minimum jumps required to make a group of persons sit together

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Given a string S of length N consisting of ‘x’ and ‘.’. The given string represents a row of seats where ‘x’ and ‘.’ represent occupied and unoccupied seats respectively. The task is to minimize the total number of hops or jumps to make all the occupants sit together i.e., next to each other, without having any vacant seat between them. 

Note: Since the count of jumps can be very large, print the answer modulo 109 + 7.

Examples:

Input: S = “. . . . x . . x x . . . x . .”
Output: 5
Explanation: Below are the required shuffling of occupants:
Step 1: Make the person at 5th seat jump 2 places to the 7th seat.
Step 2: Make the person at 13th seat jump 3 places to the 10th seat.
Therefore, total number of jumps required = 2 + 3 = 5.

Input: S = “x x x . . . . . . . . x x x x x x”
Output: 24
Explanation: Move the occupants from 1st, 2nd and 3rd position to the 9th, 10th, 11th positions respectively. Therefore, the total number of jumps required = (11 – 3) + (10 – 2) + (9 – 3) = 24.

Approach: The idea is to use a Greedy Approach to solve this problem. Observe that it is always optimal to shift the elements towards the median element among the persons or the center person among all the persons present. The number of jumps will always be minimum when we shift points to the median. Below are the steps:

  • Initialize a vector position to store the indexes of the persons present.
  • Find the median of the vector position[]. All the other persons will now be made to sit around this person as this will give the minimum number of jumps that are required to be made.
  • Initialize a variable ans that stores the minimum jumps required.
  • Now, traverse the vector position[] and for every index i find the median element and update ans as:

ans= ans+ abs(position[i] – medianElement)

  • After the above steps, print the value of ans as the result.

Below is the implementation of the above approach:

C++




// C++ program for the above approach
 
#include <bits/stdc++.h>
using namespace std;
 
long long int MOD = 1e9 + 7;
 
// Function to find the minimum jumps
// required to make the whole group
// sit adjacently
int minJumps(string seats)
{
    // Store the indexes
    vector<int> position;
 
    // Stores the count of occupants
    int count = 0;
 
    // Length of the string
    int len = seats.length();
 
    // Traverse the seats
    for (int i = 0; i < len; i++) {
 
        // If current place is occupied
        if (seats[i] == 'x') {
 
            // Push the current position
            // in the vector
            position.push_back(i - count);
            count++;
        }
    }
 
    // Base Case:
    if (count == len || count == 0)
        return 0;
 
    // The index of the median element
    int med_index = (count - 1) / 2;
 
    // The value of the median element
    int med_val = position[med_index];
 
    int ans = 0;
 
    // Traverse the position[]
    for (int i = 0;
         i < position.size(); i++) {
 
        // Update the ans
        ans = (ans % MOD
               + abs(position[i]
                     - med_val)
                     % MOD)
              % MOD;
    }
 
    // Return the final count
    return ans % MOD;
}
 
// Driver Code
int main()
{
    // Given arrange of seats
    string S = "....x..xx...x..";
 
    // Function Call
    cout << minJumps(S);
 
    return 0;
}


Java




// Java program for the
// above approach
import java.util.*;
class GFG{
 
static int MOD = (int)1e9 + 7;
 
// Function to find the minimum
// jumps required to make the
// whole group sit adjacently
static int minJumps(String seats)
{
  // Store the indexes
  Vector<Integer> position =
                  new Vector<>();
 
  // Stores the count of
  // occupants
  int count = 0;
 
  // Length of the String
  int len = seats.length();
 
  // Traverse the seats
  for (int i = 0; i < len; i++)
  {
    // If current place is occupied
    if (seats.charAt(i) == 'x')
    {
      // Push the current position
      // in the vector
      position.add(i - count);
      count++;
    }
  }
 
  // Base Case:
  if (count == len ||
      count == 0)
    return 0;
 
  // The index of the median
  // element
  int med_index = (count - 1) / 2;
 
  // The value of the median
  // element
  int med_val = position.get(med_index);
 
  int ans = 0;
 
  // Traverse the position[]
  for (int i = 0;
           i < position.size(); i++)
  {
    // Update the ans
    ans = (ans % MOD +
           Math.abs(position.get(i) -
                    med_val) % MOD) % MOD;
  }
 
  // Return the final count
  return ans % MOD;
}
 
// Driver Code
public static void main(String[] args)
{
  // Given arrange of seats
  String S = "....x..xx...x..";
 
  // Function Call
  System.out.print(minJumps(S));
}
}
 
// This code is contributed by gauravrajput1


Python3




# Python3 program for the above approach
MOD = 10**9 + 7
 
# Function to find the minimum jumps
# required to make the whole group
# sit adjacently
def minJumps(seats):
     
    # Store the indexes
    position = []
 
    # Stores the count of occupants
    count = 0
 
    # Length of the string
    lenn = len(seats)
 
    # Traverse the seats
    for i in range(lenn):
 
        # If current place is occupied
        if (seats[i] == 'x'):
 
            # Push the current position
            # in the vector
            position.append(i - count)
            count += 1
 
    # Base Case:
    if (count == lenn or count == 0):
        return 0
 
    # The index of the median element
    med_index = (count - 1) // 2
 
    # The value of the median element
    med_val = position[med_index]
 
    ans = 0
 
    # Traverse the position[]
    for i in range(len(position)):
         
        # Update the ans
        ans = (ans % MOD +
               abs(position[i] - med_val)
               % MOD) % MOD
 
    # Return the final count
    return ans % MOD
 
# Driver Code
if __name__ == '__main__':
     
    # Given arrange of seats
    S = "....x..xx...x.."
 
    # Function Call
    print(minJumps(S))
 
# This code is contributed by mohit kumar 29


C#




// C# program for the
// above approach
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
class GFG{
 
static int MOD = (int)1e9 + 7;
 
// Function to find the minimum
// jumps required to make the
// whole group sit adjacently
static int minJumps(String seats)
{
  // Store the indexes
  List<int> position =
       new List<int>();
 
  // Stores the count of
  // occupants
  int count = 0;
 
  // Length of the String
  int len = seats.Length;
 
  // Traverse the seats
  for (int i = 0; i < len; i++)
  {
    // If current place is
    // occupied
    if (seats[i] == 'x')
    {
      // Push the current
      // position in the
      // vector
      position.Add(i - count);
      count++;
    }
  }
 
  // Base Case:
  if (count == len ||
      count == 0)
    return 0;
 
  // The index of the median
  // element
  int med_index = (count - 1) / 2;
 
  // The value of the median
  // element
  int med_val = position[med_index];
 
  int ans = 0;
 
  // Traverse the position[]
  for (int i = 0;
           i < position.Count; i++)
  {
    // Update the ans
    ans = (ans % MOD +
           Math.Abs(position[i] -
           med_val) % MOD) % MOD;
  }
 
  // Return the readonly
  // count
  return ans % MOD;
}
 
// Driver Code
public static void Main(String[] args)
{
  // Given arrange of seats
  String S = "....x..xx...x..";
 
  // Function Call
  Console.Write(minJumps(S));
}
}
 
// This code is contributed by Amit Katiyar


Javascript




<script>
 
// Javascript program for the above approach
let MOD = 1e9 + 7;
 
// Function to find the minimum jumps
// required to make the whole group
// sit adjacently
function minJumps(seats)
{
    // Store the indexes
    let position = [];
     
    // Stores the count of occupants
    let count = 0;
     
    // Length of the string
    let len = seats.length;
     
    // Traverse the seats
    for(let i = 0; i < len; i++)
    {
         
        // If current place is occupied
        if (seats[i] == 'x')
        {
             
            // Push the current position
            // in the vector
            position.push(i - count);
            count++;
        }
    }
     
    // Base Case:
    if (count == len || count == 0)
        return 0;
     
    // The index of the median element
    let med_index = parseInt((count - 1) / 2, 10);
     
    // The value of the median element
    let med_val = position[med_index];
     
    let ans = 0;
     
    // Traverse the position[]
    for(let i = 0; i < position.length; i++)
    {
     
        // Update the ans
        ans = (ans % MOD + Math.abs(position[i] -
          med_val) % MOD) % MOD;
    }
     
    // Return the final count
    return ans % MOD;
}
 
// Driver code
 
// Given arrange of seats
let S = "....x..xx...x..";
 
// Function Call
document.write(minJumps(S));
   
// This code is contributed by suresh07
 
</script>


Output: 

5

 

Time Complexity: O(N)
Auxiliary Space: O(N)



Last Updated : 26 Mar, 2021
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