Solution: Implement Trie (Prefix Tree)

Explore how to implement a Trie, a tree-like data structure ideal for storing strings and performing prefix matching. This lesson teaches you to build insert, search, and prefix search functions, helping you handle string operations efficiently and understand the underlying pattern for optimizing string queries in coding interviews.

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Statement
Pattern: Trie
Solution

Statement

Trie is a tree-like data structure used to store strings. The tries are also called prefix trees because they provide very efficient prefix-matching operations. Implement a trie data structure with three functions that perform the following tasks:

Insert (word): This inserts a word into the trie.
Search (word): This searches the given word in the trie and returns TRUE if the complete word is found (i.e., all characters match and the last node is marked as the end of a word). Otherwise, return FALSE.
Search prefix (prefix): This searches the given prefix in the trie and returns TRUE if the prefix path exists in the trie (i.e., all prefix characters match), regardless of whether the last node is marked as the end of a word. Otherwise, return FALSE.