Good morning! Here's our prompt for today.

We have an array of length 2 * n (even length) that consists of random integers.

[1, 3, 2, 6, 5, 4]

We are asked to create pairs out of these integers, like such:

[[1, 3], [2, 6], [5, 4]]

How can we divide up the pairs such that the sum of smaller integers in each pair is maximized?

Here's an example input: [3, 4, 2, 5]. The return value is 6 because the maximum sum of pairs is 6 = min(2, 3) + min(4, 5).

Note that negative numbers may also be included.

Constraints

• Length of the array <= 100000
• The values will always contain integer values between -1000 and 1000
• The final answer will always fit in the integer value
• Expected time complexity : O(nlogn)
• Expected space complexity : O(1)

Try to solve this here or in Interactive Mode.

How do I practice this challenge?

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def max_of_min_pairs(nums):

    # fill in

    return max_sum_of_pairs

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import unittest

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class Test(unittest.TestCase):

    def test_1(self):

        assert max_of_min_pairs([3, 4, 2, 5]) == 6

        print("PASSED: max_of_min_pairs([3, 4, 2, 5]) should return 6")

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    def test_2(self):

        assert max_of_min_pairs([1, 3, 2, 6, 5, 4]) == 9

        print("PASSED: max_of_min_pairs([1, 3, 2, 6, 5, 4]) should return 9")

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if __name__ == "__main__":

    unittest.main(verbosity=2)

    print("Nice job, 2/2 tests passed!")

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Here's our guided, illustrated walk-through.

How do I use this guide?