2582. Pass the Pillow

2582. Pass the Pillow

Easy

There are n people standing in a line labeled from 1 to n. The first person in the line is holding a pillow initially. Every second, the person holding the pillow passes it to the next person standing in the line. Once the pillow reaches the end of the line, the direction changes, and people continue passing the pillow in the opposite direction.

• For example, once the pillow reaches the nth person they pass it to the n - 1th person, then to the n - 2th person and so on.

Given the two positive integers n and time, return the index of the person holding the pillow after time seconds.

Example 1:

• Input: n = 4, time = 5
• Output: 2
• Explanation: People pass the pillow in the following way: 1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 4 -> 3 -> 2.

After five seconds, the 2nd person is holding the pillow.

Example 2:

• Input: n = 3, time = 2
• Output: 3
• Explanation: People pass the pillow in the following way: 1 -> 2 -> 3.

After two seconds, the 3rd person is holding the pillow.

Example 3:

• Input: n = 8, time = 9
• Output: 6

Constraints:

• 2 <= n <= 1000
• 1 <= time <= 1000

Solution:

class Solution {

    /**
     * @param Integer $n
     * @param Integer $time
     * @return Integer
     */
    function passThePillow($n, $time) {
        $direction = 1;  // 1 for forward, -1 for backward
        $current = 0;    // Starting at the first person

        for ($i = 0; $i < $time; $i++) {
            $current += $direction;

            if ($current == $n - 1) {
                $direction = -1;  // Change direction to backward when reaching the last person
            } elseif ($current == 0) {
                $direction = 1;   // Change direction to forward when reaching the first person
            }
        }

        return $current + 1; // Convert to 1-based index
    }
}

Contact Links

If you found this series helpful, please consider giving the repository a star on GitHub or sharing the post on your favorite social networks 😍. Your support would mean a lot to me!

If you want more helpful content like this, feel free to follow me:

• LinkedIn
• GitHub