File: maximum-value-of-a-string-in-an-array/solution.py

Date: 2026-06-06

Time: 17:45

maximum-value-of-a-string-in-an-array/solution.py

Purpose

This file solves LeetCode 2496 — Maximum Value of a String in an Array. It defines the "value" of an alphanumeric string: if it consists entirely of digits, its value is the integer it represents; otherwise, its value is its length. The solution returns the maximum value across all strings in the input list.

Key Components

Solution.maxValue(strs: List[str]) -> int — The single method. Takes a list of alphanumeric strings and returns the maximum "value" as defined by the problem. The entire logic lives in one generator expression inside a max() call.

The branching logic per string is:

Patterns

Inline conditional + generator expression. The solution avoids an explicit loop or helper function. The max(... for s in strs) pattern is idiomatic Python for single-pass reduction — it's lazy (no intermediate list), and reads as a direct translation of the problem statement.

Single-method Solution class. Standard LeetCode convention — the class exists purely as a submission container. No state, no constructor, no auxiliary methods.

Dependencies

Imports: typing.List — used only for the type annotation on strs. In Python 3.9+ this could be list[str] directly.

Imported by: The massive importedby list is misleading — those are test files across *other* problems that happen to share the same from solution import Solution import pattern. The only real consumer is maximum-value-of-a-string-in-an-array/testsolution.py.

Flow

1. max() iterates the generator over strs.

2. For each string s, s.isdigit() classifies it.

3. Digit-only strings are converted via int(s); mixed strings yield len(s).

4. max() returns the largest value seen.

Single pass, O(n) in the number of strings, O(m) per string for isdigit() and int() where m is string length.

Invariants

Error Handling

None. The function trusts its inputs match the LeetCode contract. An empty list would propagate a ValueError from max() — there's no guard because the problem guarantees it won't happen.