Classic Data Structures in Java

Book excerpt: With this book, Tim Budd looks at data structures by providing a solid foundation on the ADT, and uses the graphical elements found in Java when possible. The beginning chapters provide the foundation on which everything else will be built. These chapters define the essential concept of the abstract data type (ADT), and describe the tools used in the evaluation and analysis of data structures. The book moves on to provide a detailed description of the two most important fundamental data abstractions, the vector and the linked list, providing an explanation of some of the more common variations on these fundamental ideas. Next, the material considers data structures applicable to problems in which the order that values are added to a collection is important, followed by a consideration of the various different ways in which binary trees are used in the creation of data structures. The last few chapters consider a sequence of more advanced data structures. Most are constructed as adaptors built on top of earlier abstractions. Hash tables are introduced first as a technique for implementing simple collections, and later as a tool for developing efficient maps. Lastly, the graph data type is considered. Here there are several alternative data structures presentations in common use, and the emphasis in this chapter is more on the development and analysis of useful algorithms than on any particular data structure.