Redesigning the data structures course with user-constructed resizable arrays

  • Authors:
  • W. Douglas Maurer

  • Affiliations:
  • George Washington University, Washington, DC

  • Venue:
  • Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges
  • Year:
  • 2005

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Abstract

There is currently a disconnect between the way in which five of the basic data structures are taught, in a data structures course, and the way in which they are increasingly used. The five data structures are stacks, queues, strings, hash tables, and matrices. Clearly all these data structures must be initially taught without reference to resizing, because the non-resizable versions of these are all very commonly used. Most teachers of data structures, however, do not go on to teach students how to write the resizable versions themselves (as opposed to using prewritten classes). We argue that this is unfortunate, from both theoretical and practical aspects.