Word Ladder II Shortest Paths | Dataford Interview Questions

Word Ladder II variation: find transformation sequences between two words (interviewer expected shortest paths).

Asked in the coding round 2 stage. BFS expected for shortest path.

Input and Output

Implement find_ladders(beginWord, endWord, wordList). Words have equal length. One transformation changes exactly one character, and every transformed word must be in wordList, except beginWord. Return all shortest sequences from beginWord to endWord, with each sequence represented as a list of words. Return [[beginWord]] when both words are equal and [] when no sequence exists.

Constraints

1 <= len(beginWord) == len(endWord) <= 5
1 <= len(wordList) <= 5000
All words contain lowercase English letters
wordList contains distinct words
All words in wordList have the same length as beginWord

Function Signature

def find_ladders(beginWord, endWord, wordList):

Your question is Word Ladder II Shortest Paths. Start with the requirements in the Question tab.

Run and submit as often as you like. When you're ready, talk me through your approach or go straight to the code.

Problem