How should I practice Minimum Steps on a Circular Letter Dial?

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Problem · String

Minimum Steps on a Circular Letter Dial

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● Easy

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Problem statement

The uppercase English letters A through Z are arranged in a circle, so A and Z are adjacent.

A pointer starts at A. You may move it clockwise or counterclockwise, and each move to an adjacent letter costs exactly one step.

Given an uppercase string inputStr, visit its characters in order. Return the minimum total number of steps required.

Function

calculateMinSteps(inputStr: String) → int

Examples

Example 1

inputStr = "BZA"return = 4

Move from A to B in 1 step. The shortest route from B to Z is B → A → Z, which costs 2 steps. Finally, move from Z to A in 1 step. The total is 1 + 2 + 1 = 4.

Constraints

inputStr contains only uppercase English letters from A through Z.