Intersection of Two Linked Lists
Difficulty: Easy
Category: DSA
Topics: Hash Table, Linked List, Two Pointers
Asked at: Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, ByteDance, Paypal, LinkedIn, Intuit
Given the heads of two singly linked-lists `headA` and `headB`, return _the node at which the two lists intersect_. If the two linked lists have no intersection at all, return `null`.
For example, the following two linked lists begin to intersect at node `c1`:
The test cases are generated such that there are no cycles anywhere in the entire linked structure.
**Note** that the linked lists must **retain their original structure** after the function returns.
**Custom Judge:**
The inputs to the **judge** are given as follows (your program is **not** given these inputs):
- `intersectVal` - The value of the node where the intersection occurs. This is `0` if there is no intersected node.
- `listA` - The first linked list.
- `listB` - The second linked list.
- `skipA` - The number of nodes to skip ahead in `listA` (starting from the head) to get to the intersected node.
- `skipB` - The number of nodes to skip ahead in `listB` (starting from the head) to get to the intersected node.
The judge will then create the linked structure based on these inputs and pass the two heads, `headA` and `headB` to your program. If you correctly return the intersected node, then your solution will be **accepted**.
**Example 1:**
**Input:** intersectVal = 8, listA = [4,1,8,4,5], listB = [5,6,1,8,4,5], skipA = 2, skipB = 3
**Output:** Intersected at '8'
**Explanation:** The intersected node's value is 8 (note that this must not be 0 if the two lists intersect).
From the head of A, it reads as [4,1,8,4,5]. From the head of B, it reads as [5,6,1,8,4,5]. There are 2 nodes before the intersected node in A; There are 3 nodes before the intersected node in B.
- Note that the intersected node's value is not 1 because the nodes with value 1 in A and B (2nd node in A and 3rd node in B) are different node references. In other words, they point to two different locations in memory, while the nodes with value 8 in A and B (3rd node in A and 4th node in B) point to the same location in memory.
```
**Example 2:**
**Input:** intersectVal = 2, listA = [1,9,1,2,4], listB = [3,2,4], skipA = 3, skipB = 1
**Output:** Intersected at '2'
**Explanation:** The intersected node's value is 2 (note that this must not be 0 if the two lists intersect).
From the head of A, it reads as [1,9,1,2,4]. From the head of B, it reads as [3,2,4]. There are 3 nodes before the intersected node in A; There are 1 node before the intersected node in B.
```
**Example 3:**
**Input:** intersectVal = 0, listA = [2,6,4], listB = [1,5], skipA = 3, skipB = 2
**Output:** No intersection
**Explanation:** From the head of A, it reads as [2,6,4]. From the head of B, it reads as [1,5]. Since the two lists do not intersect, intersectVal must be 0, while skipA and skipB can be arbitrary values.
Explanation: The two lists do not intersect, so return null.
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**Constraints:**
- The number of nodes of `listA` is in the `m`.
- The number of nodes of `listB` is in the `n`.
- `1 <= m, n <= 3 * 104`
- `1 <= Node.val <= 105`
- `0 <= skipA <= m`
- `0 <= skipB <= n`
- `intersectVal` is `0` if `listA` and `listB` do not intersect.
- `intersectVal == listA[skipA] == listB[skipB]` if `listA` and `listB` intersect.
**Follow up:** Could you write a solution that runs in `O(m + n)` time and use only `O(1)` memory?