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Shortest Path Between BST Nodes

Google● MediumINTERNONSITE INTERVIEW

Problem statement

You are given the root of a binary search tree with distinct integer values and two target values, first and second. Return the number of edges on the unique shortest path between their nodes.

If either target value does not occur in the tree, return -1. If first == second and that value exists, return 0.

Use the binary-search-tree ordering to locate where the two search paths split, then measure the distance from that split node to each target.

The problem statement continues

Pro

Examples

Example 1

root = [6,2,8,0,4,7,9,null,null,3,5]first = 2second = 8return = 2

The shortest path is 2 -> 6 -> 8, which contains two edges.

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