LESSON 387 OF 410 · PROJECTS: COMMAND-LINE TOOLS

CLI Tool: uniq v3 — Duplicates Only in Java

Practice

Build a version of the Unix uniq -d command. Given a list of lines, output only the values whose adjacent run length is greater than one — i.e. lines that actually repeat back-to-back. Each surviving value is printed once (no count, just the value), joined by \n.

Function signature:

public String uniqDups(List<String> lines)

Example:

Input: lines = ["a", "a", "b", "c", "c", "c"]

Output: "a\nc"

When printed:
a
c

The run of "a"s has length 2 and the run of "c"s has length 3, so both survive. The single "b" is dropped.

Track prev and count. When the line changes (or after the loop), flush prev only if count > 1. Use .equals() to compare strings.

if (count > 1) {
    result.add(prev);
}

The full solution:

class Solution {
    public String uniqDups(List<String> lines) {
        List<String> result = new ArrayList<>();
        int count = 0;
        String prev = null;
        for (int i = 0; i < lines.size(); i++) {
            if (count > 0 && lines.get(i).equals(prev)) {
                count++;
            } else {
                if (count > 1) {
                    result.add(prev);
                }
                prev = lines.get(i);
                count = 1;
            }
        }
        if (count > 1) {
            result.add(prev);
        }
        return String.join("\n", result);
    }
}

STEP 1 OF 13

Guided

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CLI Tool: uniq v3 — Duplicates Only in Java

Uniq V3 in Java