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Design In-Memory File System

Design a file system which supports the following functions: createPath(path, value), get(path). createPath(path, value) creates a new path and associates a value to it if possible and returns true. Returns false if the path does not exist. get(path) returns the value associated with the path or returns -1 if the path does not exist.

Constraints:

  • The file system should be case-sensitive.
  • The file system should support at most 10^4 operations.
  • The length of the path should be at most 100.

Examples:

Input: createPath("/a", 1) get("/a")

Output: 1

Explanation: We create a new path "/a" and associate a value 1 to it. Then we get the value associated with the path "/a" which is 1.

Solutions

Hash Map

Time: O(n)Space: O(n)

We use a Trie data structure to represent the file system. Each node in the Trie represents a directory or a file. The createPath function creates a new path and associates a value to it if possible. The get function returns the value associated with the path or returns -1 if the path does not exist.


class TrieNode {
  Map<Character, TrieNode> children = new HashMap<>();
  int value = -1;
}



class FileSystem {
  TrieNode root;
  
  
  public FileSystem() {
    root = new TrieNode();
  }
  
  
  public boolean createPath(String path, int value) {
    TrieNode node = root;
    for (int i = 1;
    i < path.length();
    i++) {
      char dir = path.charAt(i);
      if (!node.children.containsKey(dir)) {
        node.children.put(dir, new TrieNode());
      }
      node = node.children.get(dir);
    }
    node.value = value;
    return true;
  }
  
  
  public int get(String path) {
    TrieNode node = root;
    for (int i = 1;
    i < path.length();
    i++) {
      char dir = path.charAt(i);
      if (!node.children.containsKey(dir)) {
        return -1;
      }
      node = node.children.get(dir);
    }
    return node.value;
  }
  
}

Difficulty: Medium

Category: System Design

Frequency: High

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