TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY OF CRETE

DEPT OF ELECTRONIC AND COMPUTER ENGINEERING

DATA STRUCTURES
AND

FILE STRUCTURES

Euripides G.M. Petrakis

http://www.intelligence.tuc.gr/~petrakis
Chania, 2007

E.G.M. Petrakis Abstract Data Types (ADT) 1

 Introduction
ƒ We study data structures and we
learn how to write efficient programs
ƒ this hasn’t to do with programming tricks
but rather with
ƒ good organization of information and
good algorithms that save
ƒ computer memory and running time

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 Data Structures
ƒ Representation of data in the memory
ƒ file structure: representation of data on
the disk
ƒ e.g., collection of records (list, tree, etc)
ƒ Efficient programs require efficient
data structures
ƒ a problem has to be solved within the
given time and space constraints
E.G.M. Petrakis Abstract Data Types (ADT) 3
 Problem Constraints
ƒ Each problem puts constraints on time and
space
ƒ e.g., bank example:
ƒ start account: a few minutes
ƒ transactions: a few seconds
ƒ close account: overnight
ƒ A solution is efficient if it solves the
problem within its space and time
constraints
ƒ Cost of solution: amount of resources
consumed
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 Goals of this course
ƒ Teach data structures for main memory
and disk
ƒ Teach algorithms for different tasks and
data structures
ƒ Teach the idea of trade-offs
ƒ there are costs and benefits associated with
each data structure and each algorithm
ƒ Teach how to measure effectiveness of
each algorithm and data structure

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 Selecting Data Structures
1. Analyze the problem to determine the
resource constraints a solution must meet
2. Determine the operations that must be
supported
• e.g., record search, insertion, deletion etc.
3. Quantify the constraints for each
operation
• e.g., search operations must be very fast
4. Select data structure that best meet
these requirements

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 Costs & Benefits
ƒ Each data structure requires:
ƒ space for each data item it stores
ƒ time to perform each operation
ƒ programming effort to implement it
ƒ Each data structure has costs and benefits
ƒ rarely one data structure is better than
another in all situations
ƒ one may permit faster search (or insertion or
deletion) operations than another
ƒ are all operations the same important?
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 Abstract Data Type (ADT)
ƒ ADT: definition of a data type in terms of
ƒ a set of values and
ƒ a set of operations allowed on that data type.

ƒ Each ADT operation is defined by its

inputs and outputs
ƒ ADTs hide implementation details
ƒ A data structure is the implementation of
an ADT
ƒ operations associated with the ADT are
implemented by one or more functions
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 Logical and Physical forms
ƒ Data items have both a logical and a
physical form
1. Logical form: definition of the data
item within an ADT
ƒ e.g., integers in mathematical sense: +, -
2. Physical form: implementation of the
data item
ƒ e.g., 16 or 32 bit integers

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 Data Type
ADT:Type +
Operations Data Items:
Logical Form

Data Structure: Data Items:

Storage Space + Physical Form
functions

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ADT String: Sequence of chars
• ADT function length (s: string): integer;
post condition : length = len(s);
• ADT function concat (s1,s2: string): string;
post condition: concat = s1 + s2;
ƒ ADT function substr (s: string, i, j: integer): string;
precondition: 0 < i < len(s), 0 < j < len(s) – i + 1
post condition: substr(s, i, j);
ƒ ADT function pos (s1, s2): integer;
precondition …
post condition …

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 Definition of an ADT
ƒ Depends on the application
ƒ Different definitions for the same
application
ƒ An ADT hides implementation details
ƒ different implementations for the same ADT
ƒ When the ADT is given, its data type can
be used by the programmer
ƒ e.g., string, math libraries in C
ƒ when the implementation changes the programs
need not be changed

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 Algorithms
ƒ The method that solves a problem
ƒ An algorithm takes the input to a problem
and transforms it to the output
ƒ a mapping of input to output
ƒ a problem can have many algorithms
ƒ A program is the implementation of an
algorithm in some programming language

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 Properties of Algorithms
ƒ Effectiveness: the algorithm can be written as a
program
ƒ there are problems for which no algorithm
exists
ƒ Correctness: finds the correct solution for every
input
ƒ Termination: terminates after a finite number of
steps
ƒ each step requires a finite amount of time
ƒ Efficiency: makes efficient use of the computer’s
resources
ƒ Complexity: it must be easy to implement, code
and debug
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 Tiling Problem
ƒ The algorithm inputs a finite set T of tiles
ƒ it is assumed that an unlimited number of cards
of each type is available
ƒ asks whether any finite area, of any size, can
be covered using tiles in T so that
ƒ the colors in any two touching edges are the
same
ƒ For any algorithm there can be inputs T for
which the algorithm never terminates or
finds a wrong answer
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 Tile tile types that Tile tile types that
can tile any area cannot tile any area
From “Algorithmics”, David Harel,

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 A Termination Problem
ƒ An algorithm must terminate with the
correct solution for any input
int OddEven( int n ) {
while ( n > 1 )
if (( n % 2 ) == 0) n = n / 2;
else n = 3n + 1;
return n;
}
ƒ No one has been able to prove that the
algorithm terminates for any positive n
although most people believe that it does!!
E.G.M. Petrakis Abstract Data Types (ADT) 17
 Taxonomy of Algorithms
ƒ An algorithmic
problem that
admits no algorithm
is termed “non-
computable”
ƒ If it is a decision
problem it is
termed
“undecidable”
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 Disk Model
ƒ T = Taccess +
Trotation + Tread
ƒ Block: unit memory
size for disk
ƒ size of data
transferred in main
memory per disk
access
ƒ In most cases
page=block=track
ƒ e.g., 1, 2, 4, 8Kbytes
E.G.M. Petrakis Abstract Data Types (ADT) 19
 Disk Model (cont.)
ƒ Taccess > Trotation > Tread Î increase the amount of data which is
transferred to the main memory per disk access
ƒ large blocks, compression, data in memory
ƒ in multi-user systems, the disk head can be anywhere

time

distance coved by disk head

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