How should I practice Equal-Length Character Blocks?

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Equal-Length Character Blocks

Deloitte● EasyFULLTIMEOA

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Problem statement

Given a string s containing only 'a' and 'b', split it into maximal consecutive blocks of equal characters.

You may add letters only at the beginning or end of an existing block. Return the minimum number of letters that must be added so that every block has the same length.

Function

minAdditionalLetters(s: String) → int

Examples

Example 1

s = "babaa"return = 3

The blocks have lengths 1, 1, 1, 2. Add one letter to each of the first three blocks to obtain blocks of length 2.

Example 2

s = "bbbab"return = 4

The blocks have lengths 3, 1, 1. Add two letters to each shorter block.

Example 3

s = "bbbaaabbb"return = 0

All three blocks already have length 3.

Constraints

1 <= s.length <= 40,000
s contains only 'a' and 'b'.