Solving the Height of a Binary Tree Puzzle

Given an array representation of a binary tree, where each element corresponds to a node in the tree, and -1 denotes a null node, the task is to determine the height of the binary tree.

Consider the array [1, 2, 3, 4, -1, -1, -1]. This array represents a binary tree.

The null nodes are denoted by -1. In this example, the height of the binary tree is 3.

class Node {
    value;
    left;
    right;
    constructor(value){
        this.value = value;
    }
}

class Tree {
    root;
    constructor(tree) {
        if (tree.length === 0) {
          return null;
        }

        const root = new Node(tree[0])
        this.root = root;
        const queue = [root]
        let index = 1
        while(index < tree.length) {
            const currentNode = queue.shift();
            if (tree[index] !== -1){
                currentNode.left = new Node(tree[index])
                queue.push(currentNode.left)
            }
            index++;
            if (tree[index] !== -1 && !currentNode.right){
                currentNode.right = new Node(tree[index])
                queue.push(currentNode.right)
            }
            index++;
        }
    }
}


const getHeight = (rootNode) => {
    if (!rootNode) return 0;
    const leftMax = getHeight(rootNode.left)
    const rightMax = getHeight(rootNode.right)
    return Math.max(leftMax,rightMax) + 1
}

const solution = (tree) => {
    if (!tree) tree
    const treeObj = new Tree(tree)
    return getHeight(treeObj.root)
}


console.log(solution([1,2,3,4,-1,-1,-1]))

By applying a recursive approach and leveraging the array representation of the binary tree, we successfully determined the height of the binary tree. This solution provides a valuable insight into solving similar problems in algorithmic programming, showcasing the power of recursive techniques and data structure manipulation.