230. Kth Smallest Element in a BST

Problem Link

Description

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Given the root of a binary search tree, and an integer k, return the kth smallest value (1-indexed) of all the values of the nodes in the tree.

 

Example 1:

Input: root = [3,1,4,null,2], k = 1
Output: 1

Example 2:

Input: root = [5,3,6,2,4,null,null,1], k = 3
Output: 3

 

Constraints:

• The number of nodes in the tree is n.
• 1 <= k <= n <= 104
• 0 <= Node.val <= 104

 

Follow up: If the BST is modified often (i.e., we can do insert and delete operations) and you need to find the kth smallest frequently, how would you optimize?

Solution

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Python3

# Definition for a binary tree node.
# class TreeNode:
#     def __init__(self, val=0, left=None, right=None):
#         self.val = val
#         self.left = left
#         self.right = right
class Solution:
    def kthSmallest(self, root: Optional[TreeNode], k: int) -> int:
        res = -1
 
        def go(node):
            nonlocal res, k
 
            if node.left: go(node.left)
 
            k -= 1
            if k == 0:
                res = node.val
                return
            
            if node.right: go(node.right)
        
        go(root)
        return res