# 0243. Shortest Word Distance

https://leetcode.com/problems/shortest-word-distance

## Description

Given an array of strings `wordsDict` and two different strings that already exist in the array `word1` and `word2`, return _the shortest distance between these two words in the list_.

**Example 1:**

```
**Input:** wordsDict = ["practice", "makes", "perfect", "coding", "makes"], word1 = "coding", word2 = "practice"
**Output:** 3
```

**Example 2:**

```
**Input:** wordsDict = ["practice", "makes", "perfect", "coding", "makes"], word1 = "makes", word2 = "coding"
**Output:** 1
```

**Constraints:**

* `1 <= wordsDict.length <= 3 * 104`
* `1 <= wordsDict[i].length <= 10`
* `wordsDict[i]` consists of lowercase English letters.
* `word1` and `word2` are in `wordsDict`.
* `word1 != word2`

## ac

```java
class Solution {
    public int shortestDistance(String[] words, String word1, String word2) {
        int w1 = - words.length, w2 = - words.length;
        int diff = Integer.MAX_VALUE;
        for (int i = 0; i < words.length; i++) {
            if (words[i].equals(word1)) {
                w1 = i;
                diff = Math.min(diff, Math.abs(w1 - w2));
            } else if (words[i].equals(word2)) {
                w2 = i;
                diff = Math.min(diff, Math.abs(w1 - w2));
            }
        }
        return diff;
    }
}
```
