Data Structure L1

Data Structure
Lecture: 1
What is Data Structure?
 A data structure is a specialized format for organizing, processing, retrieving and
storing data.
 In computer programming, a data structure may be selected or designed to store data
for the purpose of working on it with various algorithms.
Importance of data structure:
 Data Structures are widely used in almost every aspect of Computer Science i.e.
Operating System, Compiler Design, Artificial intelligence, Graphics and many more.
 Data Structures are the main part of many computer science algorithms as they enable
the programmers to handle the data in an efficient way.
 It plays a vital role in enhancing the performance of a software or a program as the
main function of the software is to store and retrieve the user’s data as fast as
possible.
Examples of data structure: arrays, Linked List, Stack, Queue, etc.
The choice of a particular data model depends on the two considerations:
1. It must be rich enough in structure to mirror the actual relationships of the data in the real
world.
2. The structure should be simple enough that one can effectively process the data whenever
necessary.
Basic Terminology: Elementary Data Organization:

Data: Data are simply values or sets of values.
Data items: Data item refers to a single unit of values.
Data items that are divided into sub-items are called Group items. Ex: An Employee Name
may be divided into three subitems- first name, middle name, and last name.
Data items that are not able to divide into sub-items are called Elementary items.
Ex: SSN (Social Security Number)
Entity: An entity is something that has certain attributes or properties which may be assigned
values. The values may be either numeric or non-numeric.
Ex: Attributes- Names, Age, Sex, SSN

Values- Rohland Gail, 34, F, 134-34-5533
Entities with similar attributes form an entity set. Each attribute of an entity set has a range
of values, the set of all possible values that could be assigned to the particular attribute.
The term “information” is sometimes used for data with given attributes, of, in other words
meaningful or processed data.
Field is a single elementary unit of information representing an attribute of an entity.

Record is the collection of field values of a given entity.
File is the collection of records of the entities in a given entity set.
Records may also be classified according to length.
Prepared By Abdullah Rajib, Assistant Professor, RTM Al-Kabir Technical University, Sylhet,
Bangladesh.
Data Structure
Lecture: 1
A file can have fixed-length records or variable-length records.
1. In fixed-length records, all the records contain the same data items with the same
amount of space assigned to each data item.
2. In variable-length records file records may contain different lengths.
Example: Student records have variable lengths, since different students take different
numbers of courses. Variable-length records have a minimum and a maximum length.
The above organization of data into fields, records and files may not be complex enough
to maintain and efficiently process certain collections of data. For this reason, data are
also organized into more complex types of structures.
The study of complex data structures includes the following three steps:
1. Logical or mathematical description of the structure
2. Implementation of the structure on a computer
3. Quantitative analysis of the structure, which includes determining the amount of
memory needed to store the structure and the time required to process the structure.
CLASSIFICATION OF DATA STRUCTURES

Data structures are generally classified into
1. Primitive data Structures
2. Non-primitive data Structures
1. Primitive data Structures: Primitive data structures are the fundamental data types
which are supported by a programming language. Basic data types such as integer, real,
character and Boolean are known as Primitive data Structures. These data types consists
of characters that cannot be divided and hence they also called simple data types.
2. Non- Primitive data Structures: Non-primitive data structures are those data
structures which are created using primitive data structures. Examples of non-primitive
data structures is the processing of complex numbers, linked lists, stacks, trees, and
graphs.
Based on the structure and arrangement of data, non-primitive data structures is further
classified into
1. Linear Data Structure
2. Non-linear Data Structure
1. Linear Data Structure:

A data structure is said to be linear if its elements form a sequence or a linear list. There
are basically two ways of representing such linear structure in memory.
1. One way is to have the linear relationships between the elements represented by means
of sequential memory location. These linear structures are called arrays.
2. The other way is to have the linear relationship between the elements represented by
means of pointers or links. These linear structures are called linked lists.
The common examples of linear data structure are Arrays, Queues, Stacks, Linked lists
Bangladesh.
Data Structure
Lecture: 1
2. Non-linear Data Structure:
A data structure is said to be non-linear if the data are not arranged in sequence or a
linear. The insertion and deletion of data is not possible in linear fashion. This structure is
mainly used to represent data containing a hierarchical relationship between elements.
Trees and graphs are the examples of non-linear data structure.
Arrays:
The simplest type of data structure is a linear (or one dimensional) array. A list of a finite
number n of similar data referenced respectively by a set of n consecutive numbers,
usually 1, 2, 3 . . . . . . . n. if A is chosen the name for the array, then the elements of A are
denoted by subscript notation a1, a2, a3….. an
or
by the parenthesis notation A (1), A (2), A (3) . . . . . . A (n)
or
by the bracket notation A [1], A [2], A [3] . . . . . . A [n]
Example 1: A linear array STUDENT consisting of the names of six students is pictured
in below figure. Here STUDENT [1] denotes John Brown, STUDENT [2] denotes Sandra
Gold, and so on.
Linear arrays are called one-dimensional arrays because each element in such
an array is referenced by one subscript. A two-dimensional array is a collection
of similar data elements where each element is referenced by two subscripts.
Example 2: A chain of 28 stores, each store having 4 departments, may list its weekly
sales as in below fig. Such data can be stored in the computer using a two-dimensional
array in which the first subscript denotes the store and the second subscript the
department. If SALES is the name given to the array, then
SALES [1, 1] = 2872, SALES [1, 2] - 805, SALES [1, 3] = 3211,…., SALES [28, 4] =
982
Bangladesh.
Data Structure
Lecture: 1
1. Schaum'S Outlines Data Structure : Seymour Lipschutz

2. https://www.codesdope.com/course/data-structures-stacks/
3. https://deepakdvallur.weebly.com/data-structures-and-applications.html
4. Data Structures Using C, 2nd Edition by Reema Thareja.
5. Data Structures and Algorithms Made Easy, 5th edition by Narasimha Karumanchi.
Bangladesh.

Data Structure L1

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Data Structure

Basic Terminology: Elementary Data Organization:

Ex: Attributes- Names, Age, Sex, SSN

Field is a single elementary unit of information representing an attribute of an entity.

CLASSIFICATION OF DATA STRUCTURES

1. Linear Data Structure:

1. Schaum'S Outlines Data Structure : Seymour Lipschutz

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