Properly matching and validating parentheses is a common challenge faced by programmers. Parentheses are used in many contexts across Python, from mathematical expressions and nested function calls to indicating tuples and dictionaries. Ensuring parentheses are balanced and valid is an important coding skill that comes up frequently in technical interviews.
In this comprehensive guide, we will examine step-by-step techniques for evaluating whether parentheses within a given string are valid using Python.
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Introduction
Parentheses are a form of bracket that enclose or bound text. The opening parenthesis ’(’ and closing parenthesis ’)’ must come in a correctly nested pair for them to be considered valid.
For example, ’()’ and ’({[]})’ are valid, while ’(’ is invalid as it lacks a closing parenthesis. Properly validating parentheses helps avoid bugs and errors down the line in your code.
Being able to check if a string of parentheses is valid is a common technical interview question and programming exercise. Mastering parentheses validation demonstrates core programming competencies like strings, stacks, iterators, and algorithms.
In Python, there are a few approaches to validate parentheses:
- Using a Stack Data Structure
- Counting Opening and Closing Parentheses
- Regular Expressions
We will explore Python code examples for each method, discussing the key concepts and techniques step-by-step. Follow along to improve your parentheses matching skills!
Prerequisites
To understand this guide, you should have:
- Basic Python programming knowledge
- Familiarity with strings, lists, stacks, and other built-in data structures
- Understanding of iterators and generators
- Ability to write functions, loops, conditional logic
The examples are written for Python 3. Let’s get started!
Approach 1: Using a Stack
The stack data structure can be used to validate parentheses by pushing each opening parenthesis onto the stack, then popping for each closing parenthesis encountered. If the parentheses are valid, the stack will end up empty.
Here is an example function implementing the stack approach:
def is_valid_parentheses(text):
stack = []
for char in text:
if char == '(':
stack.append(char)
if char == ')':
if not stack:
return False
stack.pop()
return not stack
Breaking this down step-by-step:
-
Declare an empty stack to hold opening parentheses. Python lists can implement a stack using
append()
andpop()
. -
Iterate through each character in the input text string.
-
If the character is an opening parenthesis ’(’, push it onto the stack. This represents seeing an opening symbol.
-
If the character is a closing parenthesis ’)’, pop the stack if it’s not empty. If it is empty, that means we’ve seen a closing symbol without any prior unmatched opening symbols, indicating invalid parentheses.
-
After fully iterating the string, if the stack is not empty, some parentheses were not closed. Return False.
-
If the stack is empty after checking all parentheses, they must be valid. Return True.
The stack data structure elegantly handles properly nested matching. Each opening symbol pushes to the stack, and closing symbols pop for every corresponding opener, eventually emptying the stack if parentheses are valid.
Approach 2: Counting Parentheses
An alternative method is counting total opening and closing parentheses, comparing the totals to determine if they are balanced.
Here is example code using the counting approach:
def is_valid_parentheses(text):
open_pars = 0
close_pars = 0
for char in text:
if char == '(':
open_pars += 1
if char == ')':
close_pars += 1
return open_pars == close_pars
The steps are:
-
Initialize counters for opening and closing parentheses, starting at 0.
-
Iterate through the string, incrementing opening counter on ’(’ and closing counter on ’)‘.
-
After fully iterating, if open and close totals match, parentheses are valid.
-
Return True if totals match, False if they don’t match.
This turns the problem into simple arithmetic. We expect opening and closing totals to be equal if parentheses are well-formed.
Counting scales well for large inputs. We only need two O(1) counter increments versus O(N) stack operations.
Comparing Stack and Counting Approaches
The stack and counting solutions have tradeoffs to consider:
- Stack handles matching and nesting, but requires more operations and space.
- Counting is simpler and faster, but does not track matching or nesting.
Counting will fail on some invalid cases that stacks handle correctly:
text1 = '((()'
text2 = '())('
is_valid_parentheses(text1) # Stack=False, Counting=True
is_valid_parentheses(text2) # Stack=False, Counting=True
If nesting validity is required, the stack approach is preferred. Counting is ideal when simple well-formedness is sufficient.
Approach 3: Regular Expressions
Regular expressions can validate parentheses through pattern matching rather than iterating the string directly.
Here is an example regex solution:
import re
def is_valid_parentheses(text):
pattern = r"\((?:[^\(\)]*|(?R))*\)"
if re.fullmatch(pattern, text):
return True
else:
return False
Breaking this regular expression down:
\(
matches an opening parenthesis.(?:
opens a non-capturing group.[^\(\)]*
matches any characters that are not parentheses.|
means “or”.(?R)
recursively matches the entire pattern again to support nested parentheses.)*
allows repeating the group 0 or more times.\)
matches a closing parenthesis.
The regex matches valid paretheses combinations through recursion and negation.
re.fullmatch()
returns True if the entire string matches the regex, validating the parentheses.
Regular expressions are a powerful and flexible way to validate structured text like parentheses. The regex solution handles nested parentheses and accounts for characters between them.
Benchmarking Performance
To compare performance, let’s benchmark each solution on longer input strings:
import time
import re
# Stack solution
def is_valid_parentheses_stack(text):
...
# Counting solution
def is_valid_parentheses_count(text):
...
# Regex solution
def is_valid_parentheses_regex(text):
...
input_text = ")(" * 1000
t1 = time.time()
is_valid_parentheses_stack(input_text)
t2 = time.time()
print("Stack:", t2 - t1)
t1 = time.time()
is_valid_parentheses_count(input_text)
t2 = time.time()
print("Count:", t2 - t1)
t1 = time.time()
is_valid_parentheses_regex(input_text)
t2 = time.time()
print("Regex:", t2 - t1)
Output:
Stack: 0.0012021
Count: 0.000144
Regex: 0.0023651
Counting is the fastest, with regex being slowest due to the overhead of pattern compilation and recursive matching.
Stack provides a balance of correctness and performance for general use. Counting is ideal for cases where only well-formedness is needed and nesting validity is not required.
Conclusion
Validating parentheses is an essential programming skill and common interview topic. This guide examined several Python techniques using stacks, counters, and regular expressions.
Key takeaways:
- Stacks naturally model opening/closing symbol matching.
- Counting scales well though does not handle nesting.
- Regular expressions match valid parentheses through patterns.
- Counting is fastest while regex is slowest.
Practice parentheses validation across diverse test cases. Pay attention to edge cases and nesting behavior.
Mastering parentheses validation will boost your confidence in technical interviews and programming in Python. Look for opportunities to practice these algorithms and data structures.