Data Structures : Lists

Abhilash I abhilashi@students.iiit.ac.in

Basics
In C struct node{ int data; struct node * next; } In C++ struct node{ int data; node * next; }

Operations
Allocation of Memory
struct node *nn = (struct node *)malloc(sizeof(struct node)); //c node *nn = new node; //c++ style

Insertion Deletion

Variants
Structural Variants 1. Single Linked List

2. Doubly Linked List

3. Circular LInked List

4. Circular Doubly Linked List Ref:en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linked_list

Variants : operational
Stack LIFO

Queue FIFO

Problems / questions (in interviews too)

To most of the questions naive solutions are trivial Yes, optimized versions are needed We will walk through a set of problems in next slides

Problem #1
Find the maximum/mininum elements of linked list ? Trivial isn't it. A way to write the solution. node* findMaximum(node *head){ node * returnValue=head; while(head!=NULL){ if (head->data > returnValue->data){ returnValue=head; } head=head->next; } return reuturnValue; } Variable Naming/ Style of code is important

Problem #2
Find Union/Intersection of two linked lists ? Typically you would have to write a function that returns a new list, with specified criteria Write it down

Problem #3
Reverse a given linked list Hottest problem that is always asked 1. Iterative solution 2. Recursive solution Constraints (da routine ones :P ) 1. O(1) Space 2. O(n) Time

Iterative Solution
void reverse(struct node **x){ struct node *q,*r,*temp; r=*x; q=NULL; while(r!=NULL){ temp=q; q=r; r=r->next; q->next=temp; } *x=p; }

Recursive Solution
node* reverse(node** head , node* cur){ if(cur->next == NULL) { *head = cur; } else{ (reverse(head,cur->next))->next = cur; cur->next = NULL; } return cur; }

Trick: Moving Two pointers cleverly

Depends on the problem at hand. Example: Moving one pointer as slow as Tortoise, and moving another as fast as Hare. Also known as Floyd's cycle detection algorithm Next 4 problems can be solved using this trick

Problem #4
Find the kth element from the end of linked list ? Constraints 1. O(1) space 2. O(n) time

 Problem #5 : The "Y" shaped Linked List

Given pointers to two singly-linked lists, find out if they are joined and also at which node they are joined. Constriaints O(1) space O(N) time

Ref:Go to the link

Problem #6
Find the center of Linked List ? Constraint : Without using integer variables

Problem #7
Find whether a linked list has a cycle or not ? Possible approches 1. By storing the addresses all the elements already seen ? 2. By destructing the linked list ? What if we don't have auxilary storage and also do it without destructing the list ? Hint: Apply the intuition from previous slide Extension: Find the node at which the loop starts ?

Problem #8:Not so easy deletion

Given a pointer to a node in a singly linked list delete that particular node.

Problems for practice

1. Add two 100 digit numbers stored in a linked list 2. Check whether linked list is a palindrome. Each node stores a character 3. Swap two nodes of circular doubly linked list 4. Sort linked list using quick, merge, insertion, selection sorts 5. Deleting Alternate nodes in the linked list 6. XOR Linked List

Stacks
Implement a stack using 2 queues efficiently Reverse a stack inplace Implement 3 stacks in an array You are given a black box datastructure which does insertion and extract min in O(1) time. give an efficient implementation for extract max using the operations supported by it. What is the black box ? How to achieve this ?

cont
We are given with two arrays A and B..each of size N... elements of array contains either 1 or 0... we have to find such an interval (p,q)(inclusive) such that the sum of all the elements of A (between this interval) and sum of all elements of B (between this interval ) is equal... i.e. a[p]+a[p+1]....+a[q]= b[p]+b[p+1]....+b[q]

Hope this presentation is of help :-)