Date: 2026-06-06
Time: 16:54
This file solves LeetCode 1374 — Generate a String With Characters That Have Odd Counts. It constructs a string of length n where every distinct character appears an odd number of times. The solution is one of hundreds of LeetCode solutions in this repo, each following the same Solution class convention.
Solution.generateTheString(self, n: int) -> str — The only method. It exploits a simple observation: if n is odd, a single character repeated n times satisfies the constraint (one character, appearing an odd number of times). If n is even, it uses two characters — "a" repeated n-1 times (odd) and one "b" (also odd: 1 is odd).
n % 2. This is a common pattern in LeetCode "construction" problems where the answer has different structural forms depending on an input property.Imports: None. The solution uses only Python builtins (string multiplication, modulo).
Imported by: The test_solution.py in the same directory imports this Solution class. The massive "Imported By" list in the prompt is misleading — those are unrelated test files in sibling problem directories; they import their own local solution.py, not this one.
1. Check if n is odd.
2. If odd → return "a" * n. One character, one odd count. Done.
3. If even → return "a" * (n - 1) + "b". Two characters: a appears n-1 times (odd, since n is even), b appears 1 time (odd).
Total string length is always exactly n. Every distinct character count is odd. Both branches execute in O(n) time due to string allocation.
n: Both branches produce exactly n characters.n (odd). The even branch has a at count n-1 (odd) and b at count 1 (odd).1 <= n <= 500. The solution doesn't validate this — it relies on LeetCode's guarantees. For n=1, the odd branch returns "a", which is correct.None. The method assumes valid input per the problem constraints. No exceptions are raised or caught. Invalid inputs (e.g., n=0 or negative) would produce degenerate results — an empty string for n=0, or an error from negative string multiplication returning empty — but those are outside the problem's contract.
generate-a-string-with-characters-that-have-odd-counts/test_solution.py — See what edge cases the test suite covers (n=1, n=2, large n)generate-a-string-with-characters-that-have-odd-counts/review.md — Read the code review for quality notes or alternative approachesparity-construction-problems — Other LeetCode problems where odd/even parity drives the entire solution structure (e.g., cells-with-odd-values-in-a-matrix, count-odd-numbers-in-an-interval-range)find-n-unique-integers-sum-up-to-zero/solution.py:Solution.sumZero — Another constructive problem where the answer is built directly from an arithmetic property of the inputodd-count-two-branch — The solution uses exactly two code paths: all-same-char for odd n, two-char split for even neven-case-uses-two-chars — When n is even, the output contains exactly two distinct characters with counts (n-1, 1)no-input-validation — The method performs no bounds checking on n; correctness depends on LeetCode's 1 ≤ n ≤ 500 guaranteeconstant-time-logic — The branching logic is O(1); only the string construction is O(n)