I was able to do this with a single loop. The time complexity seems like O(K) where K is all items of the array. Here's how I did it in JavaScript:
First off, we represent the n^2 matrix with a single array. Then, iterate through it like this:
/**
* Rotates matrix 90 degrees clockwise
* @param arr: the source array
* @param n: the array side (array is square n^2)
*/
function rotate (arr, n) {
var rotated = [], indexes = []
for (var i = 0; i < arr.length; i++) {
if (i < n)
indexes[i] = i * n + (n - 1)
else
indexes[i] = indexes[i - n] - 1
rotated[indexes[i]] = arr[i]
}
return rotated
}
Basically, we transform the source array indexes:
[0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8] => [2,5,8,1,4,7,0,3,6]
Then, using this transformed indexes array, we place the actual values in the final rotated array.
Here are some test cases:
//n=3
rotate([
1, 2, 3,
4, 5, 6,
7, 8, 9], 3))
//result:
[7, 4, 1,
8, 5, 2,
9, 6, 3]
//n=4
rotate([
1, 2, 3, 4,
5, 6, 7, 8,
9, 10, 11, 12,
13, 14, 15, 16], 4))
//result:
[13, 9, 5, 1,
14, 10, 6, 2,
15, 11, 7, 3,
16, 12, 8, 4]
//n=5
rotate([
1, 2, 3, 4, 5,
6, 7, 8, 9, 10,
11, 12, 13, 14, 15,
16, 17, 18, 19, 20,
21, 22, 23, 24, 25], 5))
//result:
[21, 16, 11, 6, 1,
22, 17, 12, 7, 2,
23, 18, 13, 8, 3,
24, 19, 14, 9, 4,
25, 20, 15, 10, 5]