Introduction

In this blog post, we'll share the most commonly asked coding interview questions at Roblox. If you don't have months to study for your interviews, you can use AI tools like Chatmagic to generate solutions quickly and efficiently - helping you pass the interviews and get the job offer!

Problem #1: Maximize Distance to Closest Person

You are given an array representing a row of seats where seats[i] = 1 represents a person sitting in the ith seat, and seats[i] = 0 represents that the ith seat is empty (0-indexed). There is at least one empty seat, and at least one person sitting. Alex wants to sit in the seat such that the distance between him and the closest person to him is maximized. Return that maximum distance to the closest person. Example 1: Input: seats = [1,0,0,0,1,0,1] Output: 2 Explanation: If Alex sits in the second open seat (i.e. seats[2]), then the closest person has distance 2. If Alex sits in any other open seat, the closest person has distance 1. Thus, the maximum distance to the closest person is 2. Example 2: Input: seats = [1,0,0,0] Output: 3 Explanation: If Alex sits in the last seat (i.e. seats[3]), the closest person is 3 seats away. This is the maximum distance possible, so the answer is 3. Example 3: Input: seats = [0,1] Output: 1 Constraints: 2 <= seats.length <= 2 * 104 seats[i] is 0 or 1. At least one seat is empty. At least one seat is occupied.

Topics: Array

Problem #2: Task Scheduler

You are given an array of CPU tasks, each labeled with a letter from A to Z, and a number n. Each CPU interval can be idle or allow the completion of one task. Tasks can be completed in any order, but there's a constraint: there has to be a gap of at least n intervals between two tasks with the same label. Return the minimum number of CPU intervals required to complete all tasks. Example 1: Input: tasks = ["A","A","A","B","B","B"], n = 2 Output: 8 Explanation: A possible sequence is: A -> B -> idle -> A -> B -> idle -> A -> B. After completing task A, you must wait two intervals before doing A again. The same applies to task B. In the 3rd interval, neither A nor B can be done, so you idle. By the 4th interval, you can do A again as 2 intervals have passed. Example 2: Input: tasks = ["A","C","A","B","D","B"], n = 1 Output: 6 Explanation: A possible sequence is: A -> B -> C -> D -> A -> B. With a cooling interval of 1, you can repeat a task after just one other task. Example 3: Input: tasks = ["A","A","A", "B","B","B"], n = 3 Output: 10 Explanation: A possible sequence is: A -> B -> idle -> idle -> A -> B -> idle -> idle -> A -> B. There are only two types of tasks, A and B, which need to be separated by 3 intervals. This leads to idling twice between repetitions of these tasks. Constraints: 1 <= tasks.length <= 104 tasks[i] is an uppercase English letter. 0 <= n <= 100

Topics: Array, Hash Table, Greedy, Sorting, Heap (Priority Queue), Counting

Problem #3: Reorganize String

Given a string s, rearrange the characters of s so that any two adjacent characters are not the same. Return any possible rearrangement of s or return "" if not possible. Example 1: Input: s = "aab" Output: "aba" Example 2: Input: s = "aaab" Output: "" Constraints: 1 <= s.length <= 500 s consists of lowercase English letters.

Topics: Hash Table, String, Greedy, Sorting, Heap (Priority Queue), Counting

Problem #4: Valid Parentheses

Given a string s containing just the characters '(', ')', '{', '}', '[' and ']', determine if the input string is valid. An input string is valid if: Open brackets must be closed by the same type of brackets. Open brackets must be closed in the correct order. Every close bracket has a corresponding open bracket of the same type. Example 1: Input: s = "()" Output: true Example 2: Input: s = "()[]{}" Output: true Example 3: Input: s = "(]" Output: false Example 4: Input: s = "([])" Output: true Constraints: 1 <= s.length <= 104 s consists of parentheses only '()[]{}'.

Topics: String, Stack

Problem #5: Text Justification

Given an array of strings words and a width maxWidth, format the text such that each line has exactly maxWidth characters and is fully (left and right) justified. You should pack your words in a greedy approach; that is, pack as many words as you can in each line. Pad extra spaces ' ' when necessary so that each line has exactly maxWidth characters. Extra spaces between words should be distributed as evenly as possible. If the number of spaces on a line does not divide evenly between words, the empty slots on the left will be assigned more spaces than the slots on the right. For the last line of text, it should be left-justified, and no extra space is inserted between words. Note: A word is defined as a character sequence consisting of non-space characters only. Each word's length is guaranteed to be greater than 0 and not exceed maxWidth. The input array words contains at least one word. Example 1: Input: words = ["This", "is", "an", "example", "of", "text", "justification."], maxWidth = 16 Output: [ "This is an", "example of text", "justification. " ] Example 2: Input: words = ["What","must","be","acknowledgment","shall","be"], maxWidth = 16 Output: [ "What must be", "acknowledgment ", "shall be " ] Explanation: Note that the last line is "shall be " instead of "shall be", because the last line must be left-justified instead of fully-justified. Note that the second line is also left-justified because it contains only one word. Example 3: Input: words = ["Science","is","what","we","understand","well","enough","to","explain","to","a","computer.","Art","is","everything","else","we","do"], maxWidth = 20 Output: [ "Science is what we", "understand well", "enough to explain to", "a computer. Art is", "everything else we", "do " ] Constraints: 1 <= words.length <= 300 1 <= words[i].length <= 20 words[i] consists of only English letters and symbols. 1 <= maxWidth <= 100 words[i].length <= maxWidth

Topics: Array, String, Simulation

Problem #6: Integer to English Words

Convert a non-negative integer num to its English words representation. Example 1: Input: num = 123 Output: "One Hundred Twenty Three" Example 2: Input: num = 12345 Output: "Twelve Thousand Three Hundred Forty Five" Example 3: Input: num = 1234567 Output: "One Million Two Hundred Thirty Four Thousand Five Hundred Sixty Seven" Constraints: 0 <= num <= 231 - 1

Topics: Math, String, Recursion

Problem #8: Spiral Matrix

Given an m x n matrix, return all elements of the matrix in spiral order. Example 1: Input: matrix = [[1,2,3],[4,5,6],[7,8,9]] Output: [1,2,3,6,9,8,7,4,5] Example 2: Input: matrix = [[1,2,3,4],[5,6,7,8],[9,10,11,12]] Output: [1,2,3,4,8,12,11,10,9,5,6,7] Constraints: m == matrix.length n == matrix[i].length 1 <= m, n <= 10 -100 <= matrix[i][j] <= 100

Topics: Array, Matrix, Simulation

Problem #9: Rotating the Box

You are given an m x n matrix of characters boxGrid representing a side-view of a box. Each cell of the box is one of the following: A stone '#' A stationary obstacle '' Empty '.' The box is rotated 90 degrees clockwise, causing some of the stones to fall due to gravity. Each stone falls down until it lands on an obstacle, another stone, or the bottom of the box. Gravity does not affect the obstacles' positions, and the inertia from the box's rotation does not affect the stones' horizontal positions. It is guaranteed that each stone in boxGrid rests on an obstacle, another stone, or the bottom of the box. Return an n x m matrix representing the box after the rotation described above. Example 1: Input: boxGrid = [["#",".","#"]] Output: [["."], ["#"], ["#"]] Example 2: Input: boxGrid = [["#",".","","."], ["#","#","","."]] Output: [["#","."], ["#","#"], ["",""], [".","."]] Example 3: Input: boxGrid = [["#","#","",".","","."], ["#","#","#","",".","."], ["#","#","#",".","#","."]] Output: [[".","#","#"], [".","#","#"], ["#","#",""], ["#","","."], ["#",".",""], ["#",".","."]] Constraints: m == boxGrid.length n == boxGrid[i].length 1 <= m, n <= 500 boxGrid[i][j] is either '#', '', or '.'.

Topics: Array, Two Pointers, Matrix

Problem #10: Rotate Image

You are given an n x n 2D matrix representing an image, rotate the image by 90 degrees (clockwise). You have to rotate the image in-place, which means you have to modify the input 2D matrix directly. DO NOT allocate another 2D matrix and do the rotation. Example 1: Input: matrix = [[1,2,3],[4,5,6],[7,8,9]] Output: [[7,4,1],[8,5,2],[9,6,3]] Example 2: Input: matrix = [[5,1,9,11],[2,4,8,10],[13,3,6,7],[15,14,12,16]] Output: [[15,13,2,5],[14,3,4,1],[12,6,8,9],[16,7,10,11]] Constraints: n == matrix.length == matrix[i].length 1 <= n <= 20 -1000 <= matrix[i][j] <= 1000

Topics: Array, Math, Matrix