const A_LCASE = 97;
const A_UCASE = 65;
export function isIsogram(word) {
let letter_flags = 0;
for (const letter of [...word]) {
if (letter >= 'a' && letter <= 'z') {
if ((letter_flags & (1 << (letter.charCodeAt(0) - A_LCASE))) != 0)
return false;
else letter_flags |= 1 << (letter.charCodeAt(0) - A_LCASE);
} else if (letter >= 'A' && letter <= 'Z') {
if ((letter_flags & (1 << (letter.charCodeAt(0) - A_UCASE))) != 0)
return false;
else letter_flags |= 1 << (letter.charCodeAt(0) - A_UCASE);
}
}
return true;
}
This solution uses the ASCII value of the letter to set the corresponding bit position.
Some constants are defined for readability in the function.
The ASCII value for a is 97.
The ASCII value for A is 65.
-
Spread syntax is used to make an
Arrayof the characters in theword. - The
stringloops through its characters and looks for a character beingathroughzorAthroughZ. - If a letter is found, then its ASCII value is taken by the
charCodeAtmethod.
charCodeAt actually returns the UTF-16 code unit for the character, which is an integer between 0 and 65535.
For the letters a-z and A-Z, the UTF-16 number is the same value as the ASCII value.
- If the lowercase letter is subtracted by
97, thenawill result in0, because97minus97equals0.zwould result in25, because122minus97equals25. Soawould have1shifted left 0 places (so not shifted at all) andzwould have1shifted left 25 places. - If the uppercase letter is subtracted by
A, thenAwill result in0, because65minus65equals0.Zwould result in25, because90minus65equals25. SoAwould have1shifted left 0 places (so not shifted at all) andZwould have1shifted left 25 places.
In that way, both a lower-cased z and an upper-cased Z can share the same position in the bit field.
So, for an unsigned thirty-two bit integer, if the values for a and Z were both set, the bits would look like
zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcba
00000010000000000000000000000001
We can use the bitwise AND operator to check if a bit has already been set.
If it has been set, we know the letter is duplicated and we can immediately return false.
If it has not been set, we can use the bitwise OR operator to set the bit.
If the loop completes without finding a duplicate letter (and returning false), the function returns true.