Merging Sorted Array Javascript

Question

I am working through some various LeetCode problems as practice on JavaScript concepts that I don't come across in my day to day.

Starting with the easy section I am confused as to why this merging array does not work? I find that I almost never splice since I am used to just iterating over and returning a new element and rarely am I working with a giant dataset that needs to be modified directly.

My Jasmine error is as follows

Check for Sorted Merge

 ✗ Array values are merged and sorted - Expected $.length = 6 to equal 3. Expected $[2] = 2 to equal 3. Unexpected $[3] = 3 in array. Unexpected $[4] = 5 in array. Unexpected $[5] = 6 in array.

Below is the code.

//////////////////
// INSTRUCTIONS //
//////////////////

// Given two sorted integer arrays nums1 and nums2, merge nums2 into nums1 as one sorted array.
// The number of elements initialized in nums1 and nums2 are m and n respectively.
// You may assume that nums1 has a size equal to m + n such that it has enough space to hold additional elements from nums2.

const nums1 = [1, 2, 3];
const m = 3;
const nums2 = [2, 5, 6];
const n = 3;

const mergeArray = (nums1, nums2) => {
  for (let index = 0; index < nums1.length - 1; index++) {
    if (nums2[index] >= nums1[index] && nums2[index] < nums1[index+1] ) {
      nums1.splice(index, 0, nums2[index]);
    }
  }
  return nums1;
};

module.exports = function () {
  describe("Check for Sorted Merge", () => {
    it("Array values are merged and sorted", () => {
      expect(nums1.concat(nums2).sort()).toEqual(mergeArray(nums1, nums2));
    });
  });
};

Answer 1

Maybe something like this? As both arrays are sorted, we don't need to compare every m element with every n element. We can save some time complexity by keeping track of a start point, and update this each time we find a place for our n element from nums2. Hopefully it makes sense, but if not I can try to explain it more thoroughly.

 const nums1 = [1, 2, 3]; // will always be sorted const m = 3; const nums2 = [2, 5, 6]; // will always be sorted const n = 4; const mergeArray = (nums1, nums2) => { let start_idx = 0; for (let num of nums2) { for (let idx = start_idx; idx < nums1.length; idx++){ if (num <= nums1[idx]) { nums1.splice(idx, 0, num); start_idx = idx; break; } if (idx == nums1.length - 1){ nums1.push(num); start_idx = idx; break; } } } return nums1; }; const res1 = nums1.concat(nums2).sort((a,b) => ab); const res2 = mergeArray(nums1, nums2); console.log(res1, res2); //JSON.stringify not ideal for arr/object comparison, but it works here for a quick check: console.assert(JSON.stringify(res1) == JSON.stringify(res2), "sorts are not identical");