Coding questions · TikTok

Determine if a string can be segmented

This question evaluates a candidate's understanding of dynamic programming and string-processing skills, along with algorithmic complexity analysis for segmentation problems.

Given a string s and a list of strings wordDict, determine whether s can be segmented into a sequence of one or more dictionary words.

You may reuse dictionary words multiple times.
Return true if such a segmentation exists, otherwise return false.

Input

s: a non-empty string
wordDict: a list of non-empty strings

Output

Boolean indicating whether s can be segmented.

Example

s = "leetcode", wordDict = ["leet", "code"] → true
s = "catsandog", wordDict = ["cats","dog","sand","and","cat"] → false

Notes / constraints (typical interview assumptions)

1 <= len(s) <= 10^4
1 <= len(wordDict) <= 10^5
Total characters across wordDict can be large; aim for an efficient solution.

Word Break Segmentation

Hints

Model object-style prompts as operation streams when needed.
Handle empty and boundary cases before the main logic.