A string S is passed as the input. Two words W1 and W2 which are present in the string S are also passed as the input. The program must find the minimum distance D between W1 and W2 in S (in forward or reverse order) and print D as the output.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>

// Function to find minimum distance between two words in a string
int findMinDistance(char str, char word1, char *word2) {
    int len = strlen(str);
    int minDistance = len; // Initialize to a large value

    // Iterate through the string
    for (int i = 0; i < len; i++) {
        int currentDistance = 0;

        // Check for the occurrence of the first word
        if (strncmp(str + i, word1, strlen(word1)) == 0) {
            // Calculate the distance between the two words
            for (int j = i + strlen(word1); j < len; j++) {
                currentDistance++;
                // Check for the occurrence of the second word
                if (strncmp(str + j, word2, strlen(word2)) == 0) {
                    if (currentDistance < minDistance) {
                        minDistance = currentDistance;
                    }
                    break;
                }
            }
        }

        // Check for the occurrence of the second word
        if (strncmp(str + i, word2, strlen(word2)) == 0) {
            // Calculate the distance between the two words
            for (int j = i + strlen(word2); j < len; j++) {
                currentDistance++;
                // Check for the occurrence of the first word
                if (strncmp(str + j, word1, strlen(word1)) == 0) {
                    if (currentDistance < minDistance) {
                        minDistance = currentDistance;
                    }
                    break;
                }
            }
        }
    }

    return minDistance;
}

// Main function
int main() {
    char str[1000], word1[100], word2[100];

    // Input string and two words
    scanf("%s %s %s", str, word1, word2);

    // Find and print the minimum distance
    printf("%d", findMinDistance(str, word1, word2));

    return 0;
}

Explanation:

1. findMinDistance is a function that takes a string str and two words word1 and word2 as input and returns the minimum distance between the occurrences of word1 and word2 in the string.

2. The function initializes minDistance to the length of the string, representing an initially large distance.

3. It then iterates through the string using a loop.

4. Inside the loop, it checks for the occurrence of word1 and word2 at the current position in the string.

5. If word1 is found, it calculates the distance to the next occurrence of word2.

6. If word2 is found, it calculates the distance to the next occurrence of word1.

7. It updates minDistance if the calculated distance is smaller than the current minDistance.

8. The main function takes input for the string str and the two words word1 and word2.

9. It then calls the findMinDistance function and prints the result.