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Challenge: Highest Scoring Word

Instructions

Given a string of words, you need to find the highest scoring word. Each letter of a word scores points according to its position in the alphabet: a = 1, b = 2, c = 3, and so on.

You need to return the highest scoring word as a string.

If two words score the same, return the word that appears earliest in the original string.

All letters will be lowercase and all inputs will be valid.

Function Signature

/**
 * Returns the highest scoring word from a string.
 * @param {string} str - The input string.
 * @returns {string} - The highest scoring word.
 */
function highestScoringWord(str: string): string;

Examples

highestScoringWord('man i need a taxi up to ubud'); // 'taxi'
highestScoringWord('what time are we climbing up the volcano'); // 'volcano'
highestScoringWord('take me to semynak'); // 'semynak'

Constraints

• The input string will only contain lowercase letters and spaces. It can not include numbers, special characters, or punctuation.

Hints

• You can use the split method to separate the words.
• You can use the map method to calculate the score for each word.
• You can use the reduce method to find the word with the highest score.

Solutions

Click For Solution 1

function highestScoringWord(str) {
  const words = str.split(' ');

  const scores = words.map((word) => {
    let score = 0;
    for (const letter of word) {
      score += letter.charCodeAt(0) - 96;
    }
    return score;
  });

  let highestScore = 0;
  let highestIndex = 0;

  for (let i = 0; i < scores.length; i++) {
    if (scores[i] > highestScore) {
      highestScore = scores[i];
      highestIndex = i;
    }
  }

  return words[highestIndex];
}

Explanation

• Split the input string into an array of words using the split method.
• Use the map method to calculate the score for each word. For each letter in a word, we get its character code using charCodeAt(0) and subtract 96 to get its position in the alphabet (e.g., a becomes 1, b becomes 2, and so on). We sum these positions to get the score for the word.
• Find the index of the word with the highest score using a loop. If the current score is greater than the highest score found so far, we update the highestScore and highestIndex variables.
• Return the word with the highest score using the highestIndex.

Click For Solution 2

This solution looks a bit cleaner than the previous one, but it's not as efficient (difference is negligible). It uses the reduce method to calculate the score for each word, and the Math.max method to find the highest score.

function highestScoringWord(str) {
  const words = str.split(' ');

  const scores = words.map((word) =>
    Array.from(word).reduce(
      (score, letter) => score + letter.charCodeAt(0) - 96,
      0
    )
  );

  const highestScore = Math.max(...scores);
  const highestIndex = scores.indexOf(highestScore);

  return words[highestIndex];
}

Explanation

• Split the input string into an array of words using the split method.
• Use the map method to calculate the score for each word.
• Use the reduce method to sum the scores for each letter in a word. For each letter in a word, we get its character code using charCodeAt(0) and subtract 96 to get its position in the alphabet (e.g., a becomes 1, b becomes 2, and so on). We sum these positions to get the score for the word.
• Find the highest score using the Math.max method.
• Find the index of the word with the highest score using the indexOf method.
• Return the word with the highest score using the highestIndex.

Test Cases

test('Finding the highest scoring word', () => {
  expect(highestScoringWord('hello my name is xavier')).toBe('xavier');
  expect(highestScoringWord('what time are we climbing up the volcano')).toBe(
    'volcano'
  );
  expect(highestScoringWord('take me to semynak')).toBe('semynak');
});

Remember to use the provided test cases to verify your solution