Shortest Word Distance

Problem: Shortest Word Distance

We can use two variables to store index of latest read two target words so that once we get a new target word, we can update our shortest distance based on these two numbers because we won't achieve shorter distance from earlier pointers.

Code in Python:

class Solution(object):
    def shortestDistance(self, words, word1, word2):
        """
        :type words: List[str]
        :type word1: str
        :type word2: str
        :rtype: int
        """
        ans, p1, p2 = len(words), -len(words), -len(words)
        for i, word in enumerate(words):
            if word == word1: p1, ans = i, min(ans, i-p2)
            if word == word2: p2, ans = i, min(ans, i-p1)
        return ans