The structure of Segment Tree is a binary tree which each node has two attributes start and end denote an segment / interval. start and end are both integers, they should be assigned in following rules: The root's start and end is given by build method. The left child of node A has start=A.left, end=(A.left + A.right) / 2. The right child of node A has start=(A.left + A.right) / 2 + 1, end=A.right. if start equals to end, there will be no children for this node. Implement a build method with two parameters start and end, so that we can create a corresponding segment tree with every node has the correct start and end value, return the root of this segment tree. Have you met this question in a real interview? Yes Example Given start=0, end=3. The segment tree will be: [0, 3] / [0, 1] [2, 3] / / [0, 0] [1, 1] [2, 2] [3, 3] Given start=1, end=6. The segment tree will be: [1, 6] / [1, 3] [4, 6] / / [1, 2] [3,3] [4, 5] [6,6] / / [1,1] [2,2] [4,4] [5,5] Clarification Segment Tree (a.k.a Interval Tree) is an advanced data structure which can support queries like: which of these intervals contain a given point which of these points are in a given interval See wiki: Segment Tree Interval Tree
1 /** 2 * Definition of SegmentTreeNode: 3 * public class SegmentTreeNode { 4 * public int start, end; 5 * public SegmentTreeNode left, right; 6 * public SegmentTreeNode(int start, int end) { 7 * this.start = start, this.end = end; 8 * this.left = this.right = null; 9 * } 10 * } 11 */ 12 public class Solution { 13 /** 14 *@param start, end: Denote an segment / interval 15 *@return: The root of Segment Tree 16 */ 17 public SegmentTreeNode build(int start, int end) { 18 // write your code here 19 if (start > end) return null; 20 if (start == end) return new SegmentTreeNode(start, start); 21 SegmentTreeNode cur = new SegmentTreeNode(start, end); 22 cur.left = build(cur.start, (cur.start+cur.end)/2); 23 cur.right = build((cur.start+cur.end)/2+1, cur.end); 24 return cur; 25 } 26 }