* Lecture 1 [2024-01-16 Tue]


** Recommended Books

- Data Structures Using C and C++, by Langsam, Augenstein, and Tenenbaum
- Data Structures and Algorithm Analysis in C, Mark Allen Wiss

** Office Hours

- Tuesday & Thursdays, 3pm - 4pm

** Attendance

- Not mandatory
- Missing will cause a loss of /bonus/ points

** Late Work

- Point reduction for late work

** Why Study Data Structures


*** Application

- Big Data
- Data is everything and it must be managed to extract information
- Applications, websites must be optimized (Data access)

*** Student

- Fundamental
- Develops thinking for programming
- Improves solving problems with better time complexities (performance)
- Many self-taught programmer lack fundamentals of Computer Science
- Popular technologies change, Data Structures or Analysis of Algorithms remain the same

*** Textbook Definition

- Refers to a scheme for organizing related pieces of information
- Basic types of data structures include:
  - Files / lists
  - Arrays / Records
  - Trees / Tables
  - Graphs

** Types of Data Structures


*** Structures & Unions

- Stuctures
  Contains ordered group of data objects, each data object in a structure is a /member/ or a
  /field/.
- Union
  Similar to a structure except that all of its members start at the same location in memory. A
  union variable can represent the value of only one of its members at a time.

*** Graphs and Trees

- Graphs and Trees are linked abstract data structures composed of nodes.
- Each node contains a value and one or more pointers to other nodes arranged in a hierarchy.
- Graphs can be used to represent networks, while variants of trees can be used for sorting and
  searching.

*** Data Structure Operations

1. Traversal
2. Searching
3. Insertion
4. Deletion
5. Sorting
6. Merging

*** Planning a Computer Program

- As a programmer you are not supposed to start directly by coding
- The most important part of programming is brain storming on how to solve the problem
  - First step can be on paper
  - Technically we term such steps as *Pseudocode*
  - Some programmers also use Algorithm to solve the issue on paper, then start programming

*** Algorithm Specification

- An *algorithm* is a finite set of instructions that, if followed, accomplishes a particular
  task.
- All Algorithms must satisfy the following criteria:
  1. Input
  2. Output
  3. Definiteness
  4. Finiteness
  5. Effectiveness

*** How Programs Solve Problems

- Program Flow Control
  - The order in which program statements are executed
- Heuristics
  - Some problems are very complex or no algorithm exist to solve some problems, at such
    conditions programmers rely on heuristics
  - Intrusion Detection Systems can rely on heuristics to identify attacks
  - Heuristics are basically identified patterns or elements to assist in creating a solution to
    some problem