■ DSA Pattern Recognizer & Cheatsheet ■
1. Arrays
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Sorted Array Binary Search, Two Pointers, Sliding Window
Unsorted Array HashMap/Set for lookups, Sorting + Two Pointers
Prefix/Suffix Problems Prefix Sum, Difference Array, Kadane’s Algorithm
Subarray Problems Sliding Window, Prefix Sum + HashMap, Kadane’s
Rotation/Shift Problems Reverse Method, Modulo Indexing
2. Strings
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Palindrome Problems Two Pointers, Expand Around Center, DP
Substring Problems Sliding Window, Hashing (Rabin-Karp), KMP
Anagrams Sorting + Comparison, Frequency Counter, Sliding Window
Pattern Matching KMP, Z-Algorithm, Rabin-Karp
Longest/Common Subsequence Dynamic Programming, LCS Table
3. Linked List
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Cycle Detection Floyd’s Cycle Detection (Tortoise & Hare)
Reversal Iterative Reversal, Recursive Reversal
Middle Node Slow & Fast Pointer
Merging Two Pointer Merge Technique
Intersection HashSet, Length Difference Method
4. Stack & Queue
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Balanced Parentheses Stack Matching
Next Greater/Smaller Element Monotonic Stack
Sliding Window Max/Min Deque
LRU Cache HashMap + Doubly Linked List
Evaluate Expressions Stack for Postfix/Prefix
5. Heaps
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Top K Problems Min Heap/Max Heap, QuickSelect
Median of Stream Two Heaps
Merge K Sorted Lists Min Heap
Heap Sort Heapify + Extract Max/Min
Frequency Problems Heap + HashMap
6. Recursion & Backtracking
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Subsets/Combinations Recursion Tree, Backtracking
Permutations DFS + Swapping, Backtracking
N-Queens / Sudoku Backtracking with Constraints
Rat in a Maze / Pathfinding DFS + Backtracking
Word Search Problems DFS with Visited Set
7. Binary Search
Problem Type Common Patterns / Solutions
Find Element in Sorted Array Standard Binary Search
First/Last Occurrence Modified Binary Search
Search in Rotated Array Binary Search with Pivot
Peak Element Binary Search Variant
Binary Search on Answer Optimization Problems like Min Time, Min Capacity
