Reduce execution time of a code that uses binary search

Question

The problem is to create an array of player ranks based on 2 other arrays: leaderboard and player scores. More explanations of the problem here: https://www.hackerrank.com/challenges/climbing-the-leaderboard/problem.

The code below is a spaghetti but it's working fine. But, for large size of ranked array(200000 elements for example), it times out. I'm not asking for code to copy/paste. I just wanna know if there is a way to optimize this code.

int* climbingLeaderboard(int ranked_count, int* ranked, int player_count, int* player, int* result_count) {
    
    *result_count=player_count;
    // remove duplicates
    int removed=0;
    for(int i=0, j=1; i<ranked_count-removed; i++, j++){   
      if(ranked[i]==ranked[j]){
        for(int k=j; k<ranked_count-removed; k++) 
           ranked[k]=ranked[k+1]; 
        removed++;
      }
    }
    int newsize=ranked_count-removed;
    // create an array to store ranks then fill it
    int* positions=malloc(newsize*sizeof(int));
    positions[0]=1;
    for(int i=0, j=1; j<newsize; i++, j++){
        positions[j]=(ranked[j]<ranked[i])? (positions[i]+1) : positions[i];
    }
    // create and fill the results array using binary search
    int* res = malloc(player_count*sizeof(int));
    int start=0, end=newsize-1, middle=(start+end)/2;
    int j, k=newsize-1;
    for(int i=0; i<player_count; i++){
        if(i>0&&player[i]==player[i-1]){
            *(res+i)=(*(res+(i-1))); 
            continue;
        }
        if(player[i]>=ranked[middle]){
            *(res+i)=positions[middle]; 
            j=middle-1;
            while(j>=0){
                if(player[i]>=ranked[j]) 
                    *(res+i)=positions[j];
                else if(j==k) 
                    *(res+i)=positions[j]+1; 
                else break; 
                --j;
            }
            start=0; end=middle-1;
        }
        else{
            *(res+i)=positions[newsize-1]+1; 
            j=newsize-1;
            while(j>=middle){
                if(player[i]>=ranked[j]) 
                    *(res+i)=positions[j];
                else if(j==k) 
                    *(res+i)=positions[j]+1; 
                else break; 
                --j;
            }
            start=middle+1; end=newsize-1;
        }
        middle=(start+end)/2;
    }
    free(positions);
    return res;
}

Answer 1

The initial loop to remove duplicates has a potential quadratic time complexity. You can achieve linear complexity using the 2 finger approach:

    int removed = 0;
    for (int i = 1, j = 1; j < ranked_count; j++) {
        if (ranked[i - 1] != ranked[j])
            ranked[i++] = ranked[j];
        else
            removed++;
    }

More generally, the argument arrays should not be changed in spite of the sloppy prototype given:

int *climbingLeaderboard(int ranked_count, int *ranked,
                         int player_count, int *player,
                         int *result_count);

Here are simple steps I would recommend to solve this problem:

• allocate and initialize a ranking array with the ranking for each of the scores in the ranked array. Be careful to allocate ranked_count + 1 elements.
• allocate a result array res of length player_count, set the result_count to player_count.
• starting with pos = ranked_count, for each entry i in player:
  • locate the position pos where the entry would be inserted in the ranking array using binary search between position 0 and the current pos inclusive. Make sure you find the smallest entry in case of duplicate scores.
  • set res[i] to ranking[pos]
• free the ranking array
• return the res array.

Here is a simple implementation:

int *climbingLeaderboard(int ranked_count, int *ranked,
int player_count, int *player,
int *result_count)
{
if (player_count <= 0) {
*result_count = 0;
return NULL;
}
int *ranking = malloc(sizeof(*ranking) * (ranked_count + 1));
int rank = 1;
ranking[0] = rank;
for (int i = 1; i < ranked_count; i++) {
if (ranked[i] != ranked[i - 1])
rank++;
ranking[i] = rank;
}
ranking[ranked_count] = rank + 1;

int *res = malloc(sizeof(*res) * player_count);
*result_count = player_count;

int pos = ranked_count;
for (int i = 0; i < player_count; i++) {
int start = 0;
while (start < pos) {
int middle = start + (pos - start) / 2;
if (ranked[middle] > player[i])
start = middle + 1;
else
pos = middle;
}
res[i] = ranking[pos];
}
free(ranking);
return res;
}

Answer 2

Look for ways to use "branchless" to improve execution speed:

    positions[0]=1;
    for(int i=0, j=1; j<newsize; i++, j++){
        positions[j]=(ranked[j]<ranked[i])? (positions[i]+1) : positions[i];
    }

becomes

    positions[0] = 1;
    for( int i = 0, j = 1; j < newsize; i++, j++ )
        positions[j] = positions[i] + (ranked[j] < ranked[i]);

Other than this, I don't even want to try to sort out what this code is attempting.