Find the Number of Islands Using DFS in C++

In this problem, we are given a 2D binary matrix. Our task is to Find the number of islands Using DFS.

Island is a ground of 1 or more connected 1’s in the matrix.

Let’s take an example to understand the problem,

Input : bin[][] = {{ 1 0 0 0}
   {0 1 0 1}
   {0 0 0 0}
   {0 0 1 0}}
Output : 3
Explanation
Islands are −bin00 - bin11
bin13
bin32

Solution Approach

To solve the problem using DFS, we will use the DFS technique for exploring all the neighbours (maximum possible 8 of a number in the matrix) and check for 1’s. If we encounter 1 value which is unvisited, then we will consider it. We will keep a check on the values that are visited to avoid repeated visits. Doing so, we can count the number of islands present in the matrix.

Learn DFS on graphs

Learn about graphs

Example

#include <bits/stdc++.h>
using namespace std;
#define ROW 5
#define COL 5
int canVisit(int bin[][COL], int row, int col, bool visited[][COL]){
   return (row >= 0) && (row < ROW) && (col >= 0) && (col < COL) && (bin[row][col] && !visited[row][col]);
}
void DFS(int bin[][COL], int row, int col, bool visited[][COL]){
   static int getNeighbourRow[] = { -1, -1, -1, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1 };
   static int getNeighbourCol[] = { -1, 0, 1, -1, 1, -1, 0, 1 };
   visited[row][col] = true;
   for (int k = 0; k < 8; ++k)
      if (canVisit(bin, row + getNeighbourRow[k], col + getNeighbourCol[k], visited))
         DFS(bin, row + getNeighbourRow[k], col + getNeighbourCol[k], visited);
}
int findIslandCount(int bin[][COL]){
   bool visited[ROW][COL];
   memset(visited, 0, sizeof(visited));
   int islandCount = 0;
   for (int i = 0; i < ROW; ++i)
   for (int j = 0; j < COL; ++j)
   if (bin[i][j] && !visited[i][j]) {
      DFS(bin, i, j, visited);
      islandCount++;
   }
   return islandCount;
}
int main(){
   int bin[][COL] = {{1, 0, 0, 0},
   {0, 1, 0, 1},
   {0, 0, 0, 0},
   {0, 0, 1, 0}};
   cout<<"The number of islands present in the matrix is "<<findIslandCount(bin);
   return 0;
}

Output

The number of islands present in the matrix is 4