FunnyFence | Topcoder Archive

Problem Statement

A sequence of characters is called a fence if it consists of alternating '|' and '-' characters, like "|-|-|-|" or "-|-|" (quotes for clarity only). Notice that "|-||-|" or "--" are not fences, because each contains two equal characters adjacent to each other. Given a string s, find the longest consecutive substring of it that is a fence, and return its length.

Definition

Class:: FunnyFence
Method:: getLength
Parameters:: String
Returns:: int
Method signature:: int getLength(String s)
(be sure your method is public)

Constraints

s will contain between 1 and 50 characters, inclusive.
Each character of s will be either '|' or '-'.

Examples

```
"|-|-|"
```
```
Returns: 5
```
The entire string is a fence.
```
"-|-|-|-"
```
```
Returns: 7
```
Still a fence.
```
"||||||"
```
```
Returns: 1
```
A fence can be just 1 character long, so every 1 character substring here is a fence.
```
"|-||-|-"
```
```
Returns: 4
```
The last 4 characters form the longest consecutive substring that is a fence.
```
"|-|---|-|---|-|"
```
```
Returns: 5
```
"-|-|-" right in the middle gives the longest fence.

"|||-||--|--|---|-||-|-|-|--||---||-||-||-|--||"

Returns: 8

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