LeetCode Entry

3740. Minimum Distance Between Three Equal Elements I

10.04.2026 easy 2026 kotlin rust

Min sum of distances between i,j,k of the same values

3740. Minimum Distance Between Three Equal Elements I easy substack youtube

Join me on Telegram

https://t.me/leetcode_daily_unstoppable/1324

Problem TLDR

Min sum of distances between i,j,k of the same values #easy

Intuition

Brute-force.

Approach

• 2*(k-i) is the math optimization
• [101] is the space optimization

Complexity

• Time complexity: \(O(n)\)

• Space complexity: \(O(n)\)

Code

// 32ms
    fun minimumDistance(n: IntArray) = n
        .indices.groupBy{n[it]}.values
        .flatMap { it.windowed(3) { 2 * (it[2]-it[0])}}
        .minOrNull() ?: -1

// 0ms
    pub fn minimum_distance(n: Vec<i32>) -> i32 {
        (0..n.len()).into_group_map_by(|&i| n[i]).values()
        .flat_map(|v| v.windows(3).map(|w|2*(w[2]-w[0]) as i32))
        .min().unwrap_or(-1)
    }