Showing posts with label Interview question. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Interview question. Show all posts

Monday, October 22, 2012

Write a recursive procedure for Insertion Sort

Do recursion and after that insert the value.
/*
 * Helper function, Insert val at proper position
 */ 
void insert(int a[], int n, int val)
{
     int i;
     for(i=n-1; i >= 0  && a[i] < val; i--)
                a[i+1] = a[i];
     a[i+1] = val;
}
/*
 * Recursive version of Insertion Sort
 */
void insertRsort(int a[], int n)
{
     if(n>0) {
             insertRsort(a, n-1);
             insert(a, n, a[n]);
     }
}

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Print a singly-linked list backwards, in linear time



/*
 * Print a singly-linked list backwards in linear time.
 */
void print(nodeptr head)
{
        if(head == NULL) return;
        print(head->next);
        printf("%d  ",head->data);
}

Tree - List Problem

Write a recursive function treeToList(Node root) that takes an ordered binary tree and rearranges the internal pointers to make a circular doubly linked list out of the tree nodes.

/********************************************************
 ****      The Great Tree List Recursion Problem     ****
 *******************************************************/
struct node;

typedef struct node *nodeptr;

struct node {
    nodeptr left;
    int data;
    nodeptr right;
};

/*
 * given two list nodes, join them together so the second
 * immediately follows the first.
 */
void join(nodeptr a, nodeptr b)
{
    a->right = b;
    b->left = a;
}
/*
 * given two circular doubly linked lists, append them
 * and return the new list.
 */
nodeptr append(nodeptr a, nodeptr b)
{
    nodeptr aLast, bLast;

    if(a == NULL) return b;
    if(b == NULL) return a;
   
    aLast = a->left;
    bLast = b->left;

    join(aLast,b);
    join(bLast,a);

    return a;
}
/*
 * Convert given BST to linked list
 */
nodeptr treeToList(nodeptr root)
{
    nodeptr aList, bList;
    if(root == NULL)
        return NULL;
    else {
        aList = treeToList(root->left);
        bList = treeToList(root->right);
       
        root->left = root;
        root->right = root;
       
        aList = append(aList, root);
        aList = append(aList, bList);

        return aList;
    }
}
/*
 * print circular doubly linked list
 */
void printList(nodeptr head)
{
    nodeptr temp = head;
    if(head != NULL) {
        while(head->right != temp) {
            printf("%d ", head->data);
            head = head->right;
        }
        printf("%d ", head->data);
    }
    printf("\n");
}

Given a Binary Tree check whether it is Binary Search Tree or not

Write an isBST() function that returns true if a tree is a binary search tree
and false otherwise.

/*
 * Is BST helper function
 */
int isBSTUtil(nodeptr node, int min, int max)
{
    if(node != NULL)
        return (node->data >= min && node->data <=max) &&
            isBSTUtil(node->left, min, node->data) &&
            isBSTUtil(node->right, node->data, max);
    return 1;
           
}
/*
 * determine given binary tree is BST
 */
int isBST(nodeptr node)
{
    int min,max;
    if (node != NULL) {
        min = minValue(node);
        max = maxValue(node);
        return isBSTUtil(node, min, max);
    }
    return 1;
}

Check given two binary trees are same or not

Given two binary trees, return true if they are structurally identical -- they are made of nodes with the same values arranged in the same way.



/*
 * Compare two binary tree and return true if they are
 * structurally identical.
 */
int sameTree(nodeptr a, nodeptr b)
{
    if(a == NULL && b == NULL)
        return 1;
    else if((a == NULL && b != NULL) || (a != NULL && b == NULL))
        return 0;
    else {
        return (a->data == b->data && sameTree(a->left, b->left) &&
                sameTree(a->right, b->right));
    }
}

mirror()

Change a tree so that the roles of the left and right pointers are swapped at every node.




/*
 * Mirror image of given tree
 */
void mirror(nodeptr node)
{
    nodeptr temp;
    if(node != NULL)
    {
        temp = node->left;
        node->left = node->right;
        node->right = temp;
        mirror(node->left);
        mirror(node->right);
    }
}

Print all paths of Binary Tree

Given a binary tree, print out all of its root-to-leaf paths.

/*
 * Print array
 */
void printArray(int *path, int pathlen)
{
    int i;
    for(i = 0; i < pathlen; i++) {
        printf("%d ",path[i]);
    }
    printf("\n");
}
/*
 * Helper function to print all paths
 */
void printPathsRecur(nodeptr node, int path[], int pathLen)
{
    path[pathLen] = node->data;
    pathLen++;
    if(node->left == NULL && node->right == NULL) {
        printArray(path, pathLen);
    } else {
        printPathsRecur(node->left, path, pathLen);
        printPathsRecur(node->right, path, pathLen);
    }
}
/*
 * Print all paths
 */
void printPaths(nodeptr node)
{
    int path[200];
    if(node != NULL)
    {
        printPathsRecur(node, path, 0);
    }
}

hasPathSum - Binary Tree

Given a binary tree and a sum, return true if the tree has a root-to-leaf path such that adding up all the values
along the path equals the given sum. Return false if no such path can be found.

So for example, the following tree has exactly four root-to-leaf paths:
                       5
                   /        \
                4           8
              /          /       \         
          11         13        4
         /     \                     \
       7       2                    1

Root-to-leaf paths:
path 1: 5 4 11 7
path 2: 5 4 11 2
path 3: 5 8 13
path 4: 5 8 4 1
For this problem, we will be concerned with the sum of the values of such a path -- for example, the sum of the values on the 5-4-11-7 path is 5 + 4 + 11 + 7 = 27.

/*
 * "root-to-leaf path" to be a sequence of nodes in a tree
 * starting with the root node and proceeding downward to a leaf.
 */
int hasPathSum(nodeptr node, int sum)
{
    int subsum;
    if(node == NULL) {
        return (sum == 0);
    } else {
        subsum = sum - node->data;
        return (hasPathSum(node->left, subsum) ||
                hasPathSum(node->right, subsum));
    }
}

Monday, October 8, 2012

Sorting List using Insertion Sort

Write a program to sort a list using insertion sort.

/*
 * Node of list
 */
struct node {
       int data;
       struct node* next;
};
typedef struct node* nodeptr;

/*
 * Insert a node into its sorted position
 */
void SortedInsert(nodeptr* head, nodeptr newNode)
{
    nodeptr currentNode = *head;
    nodeptr prevNode = NULL;
    while(currentNode != NULL && currentNode->data < newNode->data) {
        prevNode = currentNode;
        currentNode = currentNode->next;
    }
    newNode->next = currentNode;
    if(prevNode == NULL)
        *head = newNode;
    else
         prevNode->next = newNode;

/* 
 * Insert Sort List
 */
void InsertSort(nodeptr* head)
{
    nodeptr current = *head;
    nodeptr list = NULL;
    nodeptr next = NULL;
    while(current!= NULL)
    {
        next = current->next;
        SortedInsert(&list,current);
        current = next;
    }
    *head = list;
}

Make a copy of Linked List

Write a procedure to make a copy of given Linked List.

Below we have both iterative and recursive procedure. But recursive procedure is not good as it requires extra stack space proportional to its length.

/*
 * Node of Linked List
 */
struct node {
       int data;
       struct node* next;
};
typedef struct node* nodeptr;


/*
 * Make a duplicate copy of given linked list(Iterative Procedure)
 */
nodeptr CopyListIterative(nodeptr head)
{
        nodeptr current = head;
        nodeptr newList = NULL;
        nodeptr tail = NULL;
        while(current != NULL) {
                      if(newList == NULL) {
                                 newList = (nodeptr) malloc(sizeof(struct node));
                                 newList->data = current->data;
                                 newList->next = NULL;
                                 tail = newList;
                      } else {
                                 tail->next = (nodeptr) malloc(sizeof(struct node));
                                 tail = tail->next;
                                 tail->data = current->data;
                                 tail->next = NULL;
                      }
                      current = current->next;
        }
        return newList;
}

/*
 * Make a duplicate copy of given linked list(Recursive Procedure)
 */
nodeptr CopyListRecursive(nodeptr head)
{
        if(head == NULL) return NULL;
        else {
             nodeptr current = head;
             nodeptr newList = (nodeptr) malloc(sizeof(struct node));
             newList->data = current->data;
             newList->next = CopyList(current->next);
             return newList;
        }
}

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Add two Number

You are given two linked lists representing two non-negative numbers. The digits are stored in reverse order and each of their nodes contain a single digit. Add the two numbers and return it as a linked list.
Input: (2 -> 4 -> 3) + (5 -> 6 -> 4)
Output: 7 -> 0 -> 8

Below is the working c code
 
#include<stdio.h>
#include<stdlib.h>
struct node
{
        unsigned int val;
        struct node * next;
};
typedef struct node * nodeptr;
void insert(nodeptr * head,unsigned int item)
{
        nodeptr temp = (nodeptr) malloc(sizeof(nodeptr));
        temp->val = item;
        temp->next = *head;
        *head = temp;
}
void print(nodeptr head)
{
        while (head)
        {
                printf("%d ",head->val);
                head=head->next;
        }
        printf("\n");
}
nodeptr add(nodeptr head1,nodeptr head2)
{
        nodeptr temp=NULL;
        unsigned int sum=0,carry = 0;
        while(head1!=NULL && head2!=NULL)
        {
                sum = head1->val + head2->val;
                insert(&temp,(sum%10)+carry);
                carry = sum/10;
                head1=head1->next;
                head2=head2->next;
        }
        while(head1)
        {
                insert(&temp,head1->val+carry);
                carry = 0;
                head1=head1->next;
        }
        while(head2)
        {
                 insert(&temp,head2->val+carry);
                 carry = 0;
                 head2=head2->next;
        }
        if(carry!=0)
                insert(&temp,carry);
        return temp;
}
void reverse(nodeptr *head)
{
       nodeptr h1,h2;
       h1=*head;
       h2=h1->next;
       h1->next=NULL;
       *head=h1;
       while(h2)
       {
                h1=h2->next;
                h2->next=*head;
                *head=h2;
                h2=h1;
       }        
}
int main()
{
        nodeptr root = NULL,root1=NULL,result=NULL;
        insert(&root,2);
        insert(&root,3);
        insert(&root1,9);
        insert(&root1,8);
        result=add(root,root1);
        reverse(&result);
        print(root);
        print(root1);
        print(result);
        return 0;
}

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Merge Sort

The merge sort algorithm closely follows the divide-and-conquer paradigm. Intuitively, it operates as follows.
Divide: Divide the n-element sequence to be sorted into two subsequences of n/2 elements each.
Conquer: Sort the two subsequences recursively using merge sort.
Combine: Merge the two sorted subsequences to produce the sorted answer.

We use this technique to sort a file in the following way. Divide the file into n subfiles of size 1 and merge adjacent (disjoint) pairs of files. we then have approximately n/2 files of size 2. Repeat this process until there is only one file remaining of size n.

Below is the nonrecursive procedure expaining merge sort.

#define NUMELTS  .... // .... is to be put as the number of elements in array.

void MergeSort(int x[], int n)
{
    int aux[NUMLETS], i, j, k, l1, l2, size, u1, u2;
   
    size = 1; / * Merge files of size 1;
    while(size < n) {
        l1 = 0; /* initialize lower bounds of first file */
        k = 0; /* k is index for auxiliary array */
        while(l1+size < n) { /* Check to see if there are two files to merge */
            /* Compute remaining indices */
            l2 = l1+size;
            u1 = l2-1;
            u2 = (l2+size-1 < n) > l2+size-1 : n-1;
            /* proceed through the two subfiles */
            for(i=l1,j=l2;i<=u1 && j<=u2; k++)
                /* Enter smaller into the aux array */
                if(x[i] <= x[j])
                    aux[k]=x[i++];
                else
                    aux[k] = x[j++];
            /* At this point, one of the subfiles has been exhausted.
             * Insert any remaining portions of the other file
             */
            for(;i<=u1;k++)
                aux[k] = x[i++];
            for(;j<=u2;k++)
                aux[k] = x[j++];
            /* advance l1 to start of the next pair of files. */
            l1 = u2 +1;
        }
        /* Copy any remaining single file */
        for(i=l1;k<n;i++)
            aux[k++]=x[i];
        /* Copy aux into x and adjust size */
        for(i=0;i<n;i++)
            x[i]=aux[i];
        size *= 2;
    }
}

Average case time complexity of merge sort is O(nlogn) but it requires O(n) additional space for the auxiliary array.

Quick Sort

Quick sort applies the divide and conquer paradigm. Let x be an array and n the number of elements to be sorted. Choose an element a from a specific position within the array. Suppose that the elements of x are partitioned so that a is placed into position j and the following conditions hold:
  • Each of the elements in positions 0 through j-1 is less than or eual to a.
  • Each of the elements in position j+1 through n-1 is greater than or equal to a.
If this conditions holds for a particular a and j, a is the jth smallest element of x, so that a remains in position j when the array is completely sorted.If foregoing process is repeated with the subarays x[0] through x[j-1] and x[j+1] through x[n-1] and any subarrays created by the process in successive iterations, the final result is a sorted file.

Below is procedure for quicksort.

void QuickSort(int x[],int lb,int ub)
{
    int j;
    if(lb>=ub)
        return; /* array is sorted */
   
    partition(x,lb,ub,&j);
    /* partition the elements of the subarray such that one of the elements is now at position x[j] and
     * x[i] <= x[j] for lb <=i < j
     * x[i] >= x[j] for j < i <=ub
     */
   
    QuickSort(x,lb,j-1);     /* sort the subarray between positions lb and j-1 */
    QuickSort(x,j+1,ub);    /* sort the subarray between positions j+1 and ub */
}

Now we need to implement the procedure partition.The object of partition is to allow a specific element to find its proper position with respect to the others in the subarray.
For this we need to consider a pivot element which will be at its proper position after partition. For time being consider pivot element a=x[lb]. Two pointers, up and down are initialized to the upper and lower bounds of the subarray, respectively. At any point during execution, each element in a position above up is greater than or equal to a, and each element in a position below down is less than or equal to a. The two pointers are moved towards each other in following fashion.
  • Repeatedly increase the pointer down by one position until x[down] > a.
  • Repeatedly decrease the pointer up by one position until x[up] <= a.
  • if up > down, interchange x[down] with x[up]
The process is repeated until the condition in last step fails(up<=down), at which point x[up] is interchanged with x[lb](which equals pivot element a), whose final position was sought, and j is set to up.

Below is procedure partition.

void partition(int x[],int lb, int ub, int *pj)
{
    int a, down, temp, up;

    a=x[lb];
    up=ub;
    down=lb;

    while(down < up) {
        while(x[down] <= a && down < up)
            down++;
        while(x[up] > a)
            up--;
        if(down < up) {
            temp = x[down];
            x[down] = x[up];
            x[up] = temp;
        }
    }
    x[lb] = x[up];
    x[up] = a;
    *pj = up;
}
   
Average Time Complexity of quick sort is O(nlogn). Its worst case is when the array is sorted and time complexity in that case is O(n2). It requires O(logn) additional space for the stack.

It is possible to speed up quick sort for sorted files by choosing a random elements of each subfile as the pivot element.If file is nearly sorted this might be a good strategy(may choose a middle element as pivot element). However if nothing is known above the file, such a strategy doesnot improve the worst case behaviour.

Lets see quick sort example.If an array is given as
    25 57 48 37 12 92 86 33
pivot element a = 25. so after 1st iteratin, 25 will be at its proper postion, and the resulting array will be.
    12 25 57 48 37 92 86 33
it will divide the array into two subparts (12) and ( 57 48 37 92 86 33) which needs to be sorted.
proceeding in this way following will be output after successive iterations.
    12 25 (48 37 33 57 92 86)
    12 25 (48 37 33) 57(92 86)
    12 25 (37 33) 48 57 (92 86)
    12 25 (33) 37 48 57 (92 86)
    12 25 33 37 48 57 (92 86)
    12 25 33 37 48 57 (86) 92
    12 25 33 37 48 57 86 92

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Insertion Sort

An insertion sort is one that sorts a set of records by inserting records into an existing sorted file.

Below is the insertion sort procedure code

void InsertionSort(int x[],int n)
{
    int i,k,y;
    for(k=1;k<n;k++)
    {
        y=x[k];
        for(i=k-1;i>=0 && y<x[i];i--)
            x[i+1] = x[i];
        x[i+1]=y;
    }
}

Time complexity iss O(n2) if the file is initially sorted in reverse order. On average case also its time complexity is O(n2).

Selection Sort

A selection sort is one in which successive elements are selected in order and placed into their proper sorted positions. The elements of the input may have to be preprocessed to make the ordered selection possible.
Selection sort consists entirely of a selection phase in which the largest of the remaining elements,large, is repeatedly placed at its proper position i, at the end of the array.

Below is the working procedure code.

void SelectionSort(int x[], int n)
{
    int i,indx,j,large;
   
    for(i=n-1;i>0;i--)
    {
        large = x[0];
        indx = 0;
        for(j=1;j<=i;j++)
            if(x[j]>large)
            {
                large = x[j];
                indx = j;
            }
        x[indx] = x[i];
        x[i] = large;
    }

The above procedure will sort the array in ascending order.
Consider the elements of array are
25 57 48 37 12
Here we will see the state of array after each iteration.
iteration 0     25 57 48 37 12
iteration 1    25 12 48 37 57
iteration 2    25 12 37 48 57
iteration 3    25 12 37 48 57
iteration 4    12 25 37 48 57

Average time complexity of selection sort is O(n2).

Bubble Sort

The basic idea of bubble sort is to pass through the file sequentially several times. Each pass consists of comparing each element in the file with its successor(x[i] with x[i+1]) and interchanging the two elements if they are not in proper order.

Below is the working procedure code.

void BubbleSort(int x[], int n)
{
    int tmp,i,j;
    int switched = 1;
   
    for(i=0;i<n-1 && switched==1;i++)
    {   
        /* idea of using switched variable is if there
         * is no interchanging of element in one complete
         * array iteration means array is sorted .
         */
        switched = 0;
        for(j=0;j<n-i-1;j++)
            if(x[j]>x[j+1])
            {
                switched = 1;
                tmp = x[j];
                x[j] = x[j+1];
                x[j+1] = tmp;
            }
    }
}

The above procedure will sort the array in ascending order.
Consider the elements of array are
25 57 48 37 12
Here we will see the state of array after each iteration.
iteration 0     25 57 48 37 12
iteration 1    25 37 48 12 57
iteration 2    25 37 12 48 57
iteration 3    25 12 37 48 57
iteration 4    12 25 37 48 57

Time complexity of bubble sort in average case is O(n2). But in case if the file is already sorted time complexity of this sort will be O(n).

Sorting

It is rearranging a collection of items into increasing or decreasing order. Sorting is used to preprocess the collection to make searching faster, as well as to identify items that are similar.

A sort can be classified as
internal - if the records that it is sorting are within main memory.
external - if some of the records that it is sorting are in auxiliary storage.

There are large number of sorting techniques. Some of them  with there average time complexity are:
Bubble Sort       O(n2)
Selection Sort    O(n2)
Insertion Sort     O(n2)
Quick Sort         O(nlogn)
Merge Sort        O(nlogn)
Heap Sort          O(nlogn)

An ideal sort is an inplace sort whose additional space requirement is O(1).

A sorting technique is said to be stable if for all records i and j such that k[i] equals k[j], if r[i] precedes r[j] in original file, r[i] precedes r[j] in the sorted file. Here, k[i] refer to key associated with each record r[i].

which sort is better we can't tell it totally depends upon the problem characteristics where which will be more suitable.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Binary Search Trees(BSTs)

A Problem with arrays is adding and deleting elements to an arrays is computationally expensive, particularly when the array needs to stay sorted. BSTs are similar to arrays in that the keys are in a sorted order but they are easier to perform insertions and deletions into. But BSTs require more space than arrays.
The key lookup, insert, and delete operations for BSTs take time proprotional to the height of the tree, which can in worst case be O(n), if inserts and deletes are naively implemented. However there are implementations of insert and delete which gurantee the tree has height O(logn). These requires sorting and updating additional data at the tree nodes. Red-black trees are an example of such balanced BSTs and they are used in the C++ STL library to implement sets.

BSTs are different from trees. Specifically, in a BST, there is positionality as well as order associated with the children of nodes. Furthermore, the values stored at nodes have to respect the BST property - key stored at a node is greater than or equal to the keys stored in the nodes of its left subchild and less than or equal to the values stored in the nodes of its right subchild.

Below is video lecture related to red-black tree.



Hashing

Hashing is another approach to searching. The idea of hashing is to store keys in an array of length m. keys are stored in array locations based on the "hash code" of the key. The hash code is an integer computed from the key by a hash function. If the hash function is chosen well, the keys are distributed across the array locations uniformly randomly.

There is always the possibility of two keys mapping to the same location, in which case a "collision" is said to occur. The standard mechanism to deal with collisions is to maintain a linked list of keys at each location. Look ups, inserts, and deletes take O(1+n/m) complexity, where n is the number of keys. If the "load" n/m grows large, the table can be rehashed to one with a larger number of locations; the keys are moved to the new tables. Rehashing is expensive.

One disadvantage of hashing is the need for a good hash function.



Here below is lecture which discuss hashing in details.



Suppose that in addition to being sorted, the entries of A are distinct integers. Design an efficient algorithm for finding an index i such that A[i]=i or indicating that no such index exists. 

We can apply binary search technique for this too as we are aware that array is sorted and have distinct elements.

Below is the working code in C

#include<stdio.h>
int bsearch(int a[],int size)
{
    int low=0;
    int up=size-1;
    int mid;
    while(low <= up) {
        mid=(low+up)/2;
        if(a[mid]==mid)
            return mid;
        else if(a[mid]<mid)
            low = mid+1;
        else
            up = mid-1;
    }
    return -1;
}
int main()
{
    int arr[10]={-1,0,2,4,6,8,10,12,14,15};
    int pos;
    pos=bsearch(arr,10);
    if(pos == -1)
        printf("element for a[i] == i is not found\n");
    else
        printf("element for a[i] == i is at location %d\n",pos+1);
    return 0;
}