Solve Anagram Without Sorting
Company: Pilot
Role: Software Engineer
Category: Coding & Algorithms
Difficulty: easy
Interview Round: Technical Screen
Given two strings `s` and `t`, return `true` if `t` is an anagram of `s`, and `false` otherwise. You may **not** sort either string.
An anagram uses exactly the same characters with the same frequencies, but possibly in a different order.
Assume both strings contain only lowercase English letters.
Examples:
- `s = "listen"`, `t = "silent"` -> `true`
- `s = "rat"`, `t = "car"` -> `false`
Can you solve this in linear time using a hash table or frequency-count approach?
Quick Answer: This question evaluates proficiency in string manipulation, character frequency analysis, and asymptotic time/space complexity reasoning. It is commonly asked in the coding & algorithms domain to test practical application of basic data structures (string processing and frequency-based counting), correctness under input constraints, and the ability to design efficient, linear-time solutions rather than purely conceptual reasoning.
Return whether two lowercase strings are anagrams using character counts, not sorting.
Constraints
- Inputs are Python literals matching the function signature.
- Return a deterministic exact-match value.
Examples
Input: ('listen','silent')
Expected Output: True
Explanation: Anagrams have equal counts.
Input: ('rat','car')
Expected Output: False
Explanation: Different counts.
Hints
- Clarify edge cases before coding.
- Keep the return value deterministic.