You are given an integer array height of length n. There are n vertical lines drawn such that the two endpoints of the ith line are (i, 0) and (i, height[i]).
Find two lines that together with the x-axis form a container, such that the container contains the most water.
Return the maximum amount of water a container can store.
Notice that you may not slant the container.
Example 1:
Input: height = [1,8,6,2,5,4,8,3,7]
Output: 49
Explanation: The above vertical lines are represented by array [1,8,6,2,5,4,8,3,7]. In this case, the max area of water (blue section) the container can contain is 49.
Example 2:
Input: height = [1,1]
Output: 1
Constraints:
n == height.length
2 <= n <= 105
0 <= height[i] <= 104
Solutions
Solution 1: Two Pointers
We use two pointers $l$ and $r$ to point to the left and right ends of the array, respectively, i.e., $l = 0$ and $r = n - 1$, where $n$ is the length of the array.
Next, we use a variable $\textit{ans}$ to record the maximum capacity of the container, initially set to $0$.
Then, we start a loop. In each iteration, we calculate the current capacity of the container, i.e., $\textit{min}(height[l], height[r]) \times (r - l)$, and compare it with $\textit{ans}$, assigning the larger value to $\textit{ans}$. Then, we compare the values of $height[l]$ and $height[r]$. If $\textit{height}[l] < \textit{height}[r]$, moving the $r$ pointer will not improve the result because the height of the container is determined by the shorter vertical line, so we move the $l$ pointer. Otherwise, we move the $r$ pointer.
After the iteration, we return $\textit{ans}$.
The time complexity is $O(n)$, where $n$ is the length of the array $\textit{height}$. The space complexity is $O(1)$.