Month: August 2023

You are given two strings word1 and word2. Merge the strings by adding letters in alternating order, starting with word1. If a string is longer than the other, append the additional letters onto the end of the merged string.

Return the merged string.

Example 1:

Input: word1 = "abc", word2 = "pqr"
Output: "apbqcr"
Explanation: The merged string will be merged as so:
word1:  a   b   c
word2:    p   q   r
merged: a p b q c r

Example 2:

Input: word1 = "ab", word2 = "pqrs"
Output: "apbqrs"
Explanation: Notice that as word2 is longer, "rs" is appended to the end.
word1:  a   b 
word2:    p   q   r   s
merged: a p b q   r   s

Example 3:

Input: word1 = "abcd", word2 = "pq"
Output: "apbqcd"
Explanation: Notice that as word1 is longer, "cd" is appended to the end.
word1:  a   b   c   d
word2:    p   q 
merged: a p b q c   d

Constraints:

• 1 <= word1.length, word2.length <= 100
• word1 and word2 consist of lowercase English letters.

This was my solution:

class Solution:
    def mergeAlternately(self, word1: str, word2: str) -> str:
        letters = []
        for index, letter in enumerate(word1):
            letters.append(letter)
            try:
                letters.append(word2[index])
            except IndexError:
                pass
        
        word1_size = len(word1)
        if len(word2) > word1_size:
            l = list(word2[word1_size:])
            letters.extend(l)

        return ''.join(letters)