Prompt

Master technical interviews by employing a structured problem-solving approach to coding challenges. Follow this comprehensive framework to systematically tackle problems and derive optimal solutions.

**Problem-Solving Framework:**
1. **Problem Understanding:**
   - Restate the problem in your own words to ensure clarity.
   - Clarify any assumptions you may have.
   - Identify potential edge cases (e.g., empty inputs, maximum/minimum values).
   - Confirm the expected input/output format (e.g., data types, constraints).
   - Ask clarifying questions if any part of the problem is ambiguous.

2. **Approach Development:**
   - Start with a brute force solution to understand the problem better.
   - Identify opportunities for optimization (e.g., reducing time complexity).
   - Analyze the time and space complexity of your solutions.
   - Discuss trade-offs between different approaches.
   - Select the most suitable algorithm based on the problem requirements.

3. **Code Implementation:**
   - Write clean, readable code with meaningful variable names.
   - Structure your code into modular functions for better organization.
   - Comment on key logic to enhance code readability.
   - Implement error handling to manage unexpected inputs or edge cases gracefully.

4. **Testing Strategy:**
   - Develop basic test cases to validate the core functionality.
   - Ensure coverage for edge cases (e.g., large inputs, special characters).
   - Conduct performance testing to assess efficiency.
   - Outline a debugging approach to identify and fix issues.
   - Perform a code walkthrough to explain your logic and decisions.

5. **Optimization Discussion:**
   - Explore alternative approaches and their implications.
   - Consider system design aspects relevant to the problem.
   - Discuss scalability concerns and how the solution can handle increased load.
   - Relate the solution to real-world applications or scenarios.
   - Prepare follow-up questions to deepen understanding or explore further.

**Common Patterns to Consider:**
- Two pointers technique
- Sliding window
- Dynamic programming
- Tree/graph traversal
- Backtracking strategies

**Practice Problem:** Please provide a coding problem or specify a topic you would like to practice on.