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Coding questions · Pilot

Solve Anagram Without Sorting

This question evaluates proficiency in string manipulation, character frequency analysis, and asymptotic time/space complexity reasoning. It is commonly asked in the coding & algorithms domain to test practical application of basic data structures (string processing and frequency-based counting), correctness under input constraints, and the ability to design efficient, linear-time solutions rather than purely conceptual reasoning.

Given two strings s and t, return true if t is an anagram of s, and false otherwise. You may not sort either string.

An anagram uses exactly the same characters with the same frequencies, but possibly in a different order.

Assume both strings contain only lowercase English letters.

Examples:

  • s = "listen", t = "silent" -> true
  • s = "rat", t = "car" -> false

Can you solve this in linear time using a hash table or frequency-count approach?

Anagram Without Sorting

Return whether two lowercase strings are anagrams using character counts, not sorting.

Hints

  1. Clarify edge cases before coding.
  2. Keep the return value deterministic.