2095. Delete the Middle Node of a Linked List

Medium


You are given the head of a linked list. Delete the middle node, and return the head of the modified linked list.

The middle node of a linked list of size n is the ⌊n / 2⌋th node from the start using 0-based indexing, where ⌊x⌋ denotes the largest integer less than or equal to x.

  • For n = 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, the middle nodes are 0, 1, 1, 2, and 2, respectively.

 

Example 1:

Input: head = [1,3,4,7,1,2,6]
Output: [1,3,4,1,2,6]
Explanation:
The above figure represents the given linked list. The indices of the nodes are written below.
Since n = 7, node 3 with value 7 is the middle node, which is marked in red.
We return the new list after removing this node. 

Example 2:

Input: head = [1,2,3,4]
Output: [1,2,4]
Explanation:
The above figure represents the given linked list.
For n = 4, node 2 with value 3 is the middle node, which is marked in red.

Example 3:

Input: head = [2,1]
Output: [2]
Explanation:
The above figure represents the given linked list.
For n = 2, node 1 with value 1 is the middle node, which is marked in red.
Node 0 with value 2 is the only node remaining after removing node 1.

 

Constraints:

  • The number of nodes in the list is in the range [1, 105].
  • 1 <= Node.val <= 105


Hints:


 # Definition for singly-linked list.
# class ListNode:
#     def __init__(self, val=0, next=None):
#         self.val = val
#         self.next = next
class Solution:
    def deleteMiddle(self, head: Optional[ListNode]) -> Optional[ListNode]:

        if not head.next:
            return None

        s_head = ListNode(0, head)
        node = head
        slow, fast = node, node
        slow_prev = s_head

        while fast and fast.next:
            slow_prev = slow 
            slow = slow.next 
            fast = fast.next.next


        #print(slow_prev.val, slow.next.val)
        slow_prev.next = slow.next


        return head

Random Note


From python 3.7 dict guarantees that order will be kept as they inserted, and popitem will use LIFO order but we need FIFO type system. so we need OrderedDict which have popIten(last = T/F) for this req. One thing, next(iter(dict)) will return the first key of the dict