Longest Valid Parentheses

32. Longest Valid Parentheses

Given a string containing just the characters '(' and ')', find the length of the longest valid (well-formed) parentheses substring.

For "(()", the longest valid parentheses substring is "()", which has length = 2.

Another example is ")()())", where the longest valid parentheses substring is "()()", which has length = 4.

public class Solution {
    public int longestValidParentheses(String s) {
        if (s == null || s.length() == 0) {
            return 0;
        }
        
        Stack<Integer> stack = new Stack<>();
        int start = 0, maxLen = 0;
        
        for (int i = 0; i < s.length(); i++) {
            if (s.charAt(i) == '(') {
                stack.push(i);
            } else {
                if (stack.isEmpty()) {
                    start = i + 1;
                } else {
                    stack.pop();
                    
                    if (stack.isEmpty()) {
                        maxLen = Math.max(maxLen, i - start + 1);
                    } else {
                        maxLen = Math.max(maxLen, i - stack.peek());
                    }
                }
            }
        }
        
        return maxLen;
    }
}

Hope this helps,
Michael