I'm a beginner learning Java and after reading the docs I'm trying to solve some of the problems at codingbat.com. Some I managed to solve pretty quickly in a matter of seconds but some not quite. The problems themselves are easy (example http://codingbat.com/prob/p126212) but I sometimes have a hard time finding the solutions. In part because I think of the best possible solution and automatically discard the ones that might work but aren't so elegant and in part because I can't find the right algorithm. This is either due to my inexperience (I have used PHP for web development for about 2 months so I'm not a total beginner - even worked with one framework to build a website) or due to my inability to think of a good algorithm.
I normally don't look at the solutions. I sometimes get stuck even for 1 1/5 hours at simple problems and some of them I eventually solve but some I can't so I eventually look at the solution.
Is it normal/good/bad to concentrate this long if I find a problem I can't solve? I might overreact but should this be so hard for me? Is there such thing as not being able to think of algorithms even with much learning and reading?
Thank you all in advance.
return str.replace("yak", "");
. Can you point to a more difficult problem?