The Art of Sorting: The Final Frontier in Anagram Detection

Why Sorting?

After normalizing the case of each string, the next logical step is to sort the characters. Sorting them will line up the characters in each string like soldiers in formation, ready for a face-to-face comparison.

Why a String over an Array?

In some programming languages, comparing arrays requires a deep equality check. Strings, however, can be compared easily using basic equality operators. By sorting and then joining the array of characters back into a string, we reduce the problem to a simpler string comparison.

Step 2: Sorting and Joining for Direct Comparison

Once the strings are in lowercase, we sort the characters in each string and then join them back into new strings. This transformation ensures that if the strings are anagrams, they will now be identical.

1a = a.split('').sort().join('');
2b = b.split('').sort().join('');
3return a === b;

Wrapping It Up

If the transformed strings are equal, it implies the original strings are anagrams of each other. If not, they are as unrelated as 'earth' is to 'heart', except in anagram land, where they are, in fact, twins separated at birth!