Katkat

Build an Ordered Latest-Quote Container

Chicago Trading CompanySoftware Engineer · Technical Screen

Last updated

Build an insertion-ordered container that stores only the latest quote for each stock symbol. Support expected O(1) push, pop, and size operations while updating bid and ask values without changing a symbol's original position and safely rejecting malformed commands.

Build an Ordered Latest-Quote Container

Implement a top-level operation runner for incoming stock quotes. At most one quote per symbol may be present.

def run_quote_container(operations: list[list]) -> list:
 ...

Operations are encoded as:

  • ["push", symbol, bid, ask]: insert or update a quote and append None to results.
  • ["pop"]: remove the oldest remaining symbol and append its latest [symbol, bid, ask], or append None when empty.
  • ["size"]: append the current number of symbols.

Malformed or unknown operations append the string "ValueError" and leave state unchanged. The first valid push of a symbol establishes its position in insertion order. A later valid push for that symbol replaces its bid and ask without changing that position. Every valid operation must run in expected O(1) time.

Example

Input operations:
[
 ["push", "AAPL", 95, 97],
 ["push", "GOOG", 500, 540],
 ["push", "MSFT", 30, 34],
 ["push", "GOOG", 501, 520],
 ["push", "AAPL", 94, 98],
 ["size"], ["pop"],
 ["push", "MSFT", 32, 35],
 ["pop"], ["pop"], ["pop"]
]

Output:
[
 None, None, None, None, None,
 3, ["AAPL", 94, 98], None,
 ["GOOG", 501, 520], ["MSFT", 32, 35], None
]

Constraints

  • Symbols are nonempty case-sensitive strings.
  • Bid and ask are integers.
  • The container may hold up to 200_000 distinct symbols.
  • Operation records must have exactly the shapes defined above.

Clarifications

  • This practice version follows the example: updating a symbol does not make it newest in the ordering.
  • After a symbol is popped, a later push of that symbol is a new first arrival and appends it to the back.

Hints

  • One requirement concerns order; another requires direct access by symbol.
  • Choose representations that let a replacement update the exact ordered element without scanning.