I have an abstract data type that can be viewed as a list stored left to right, with the following possible operations: Push: add a new item to the left end of the list Pop: remove the item on the left end of the list Pull: remove the item on the right end of the list Implement this using three stacks and constant additional memory, so ...
I happened to read on Wikipedia that the amortized time per operation on a disjoint set (union two elements, find parent of a specific element) is O(a(n)), where a(n) is the inverse Ackermann function, which grows very fast. Can anyone explain why this is true? ...
For instance, suppose I have an algorithm that's O(n) and an algorithm that's an amortized O(n). Is it fair to say that in strictly big oh terms, the non-amortized algorithm will always be as fast or faster than the amortized algorithm? Or is there ever any reason to prefer the amortized version (ignoring things like code simplicity or...
Here's a breakdown on the union/find algorithm for disjoint set forests on wikipedia: Barebone disjoint-set forests... (O(n)) ... with union by rank ... (now improved to O(log(n)) ... with path compression (now improved to O(a(n)), effectively O(1)) Implementing union by rank necessitates that each node keeps a rank field for com...