Candy Distribution Problem | Dataford Interview Questions

Minimum candies for children by rating (each child at least one, higher rating than neighbour gets more)

Asked in the PS/DS stage. Given an integer array ratings, return the minimum total number of candies required.

Contract

Implement minimum_candies(ratings). Each child must receive at least one candy. If a child has a higher rating than an immediate neighbor, that child must receive more candies than that neighbor. Return the minimum possible total as an integer.

Constraints

1 <= len(ratings) <= 10^5
0 <= ratings[i] <= 10^5

Function Signature

def minimum_candies(ratings):

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Problem