Remove Duplicates from Sorted Array

Problem Description

Given an integer array nums sorted in non-decreasing order, remove the duplicates in-place such that each unique element appears only once. The relative order of the elements should be kept the same.

Consider the number of unique elements in nums to be k​​​​​​​​​​​​​​. After removing duplicates, return the number of unique elements k.

The first k elements of nums should contain the unique numbers in sorted order. The remaining elements beyond index k - 1 can be ignored.

Custom Judge:

The judge will test your solution with the following code:

int[] nums = [...]; // Input array
int[] expectedNums = [...]; // The expected answer with correct length

int k = removeDuplicates(nums); // Calls your implementation

assert k == expectedNums.length;
for (int i = 0; i < k; i++) {
    assert nums[i] == expectedNums[i];
}

If all assertions pass, then your solution will be accepted.

 

Example 1:

Input: nums = [1,1,2]
Output: 2, nums = [1,2,_]
Explanation: Your function should return k = 2, with the first two elements of nums being 1 and 2 respectively.
It does not matter what you leave beyond the returned k (hence they are underscores).

Example 2:

Input: nums = [0,0,1,1,1,2,2,3,3,4]
Output: 5, nums = [0,1,2,3,4,_,_,_,_,_]
Explanation: Your function should return k = 5, with the first five elements of nums being 0, 1, 2, 3, and 4 respectively.
It does not matter what you leave beyond the returned k (hence they are underscores).

 

Constraints:

Solution (JavaScript)

/**
 * @param {number[]} nums
 * @return {number}
 */
var removeDuplicates = function(nums) {
    let j = 0;
    for(let i = 1; i < nums.length; i++) {
        if(nums[i] != nums[j]) {
            j++;
            nums[j] = nums[i];
        }
    }
    return j + 1;
};