singlelinked

A single linked list is a fundamental data structure in computer science. It consists of a sequence of nodes, where each node contains data and a pointer to the next node in the sequence. The list is terminated by a null pointer, indicating the end of the list. The first node in the list is referred to as the head.

Traversing a single linked list involves starting at the head and following the pointers from one node to the next until the end is reached. Insertion and deletion operations can be performed efficiently. To insert a new node, a new node is created, its pointer is set to the node that was previously pointed to by the node before the insertion point, and the preceding node's pointer is updated to point to the new node. For deletion, the preceding node's pointer is updated to bypass the node to be deleted, effectively removing it from the list.

Single linked lists are used in various applications, including implementing stacks, queues, and managing dynamic memory. Their primary advantage lies in their ability to grow or shrink dynamically, unlike arrays which have a fixed size. However, they do not support random access; to access a specific element, one must traverse the list from the beginning. This sequential access makes searching or accessing elements in the middle of a large list less efficient compared to data structures like arrays or hash tables. The memory overhead per element is also slightly higher due to the storage required for the pointer in each node.