lecture 2 aug 27-10 goals: introduction to recursion examples of recursive programs
Post on 19-Dec-2015
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Recursion
Recursive function•A function defined in terms of itself e.g. f(x)= 2 * f(x – 1)
Recursive definition• a concept defined in terms of itself. e.g. an arithmetic expression is either a number, or is of the form X op Y where X and Y are arithmetic expressions and op is an operator.
Recursion
Recursive data structure• a structure whose substructure is of the same type as the structure
e.g. a binary tree is either a single node or a node with two children both of which are also binary trees.
Recursive program• program that calls itself.
int F(int x) { if (x == 1) return 1; else return 2 * F(x – 1); }
Recursion - rules
Rule 1: Provide exit from recursion. (focus on base cases – some times, more than one base case is needed.)
Rule 2: Make sure that the successive recursive calls progress towards the base case.
Rule 3: Assume that recursive calls work.
Rule 4: Compound interest rule: Avoid redundant calls.
Recursion – simple examples
1) Compute n! n! = 1 x 2 … x n = (n – 1)! x n
2) Compute 1 + 2 + … + n f(n) = n + f(n – 1)
3) Compute the n-th Fibonacci number f(n) = f(n – 1) + f(n – 2)
Example: (from Chapter 2 of text)
Given x and n, we want to compute xn.
Obvious iterative solution: int exp(int x, int n) { int temp = x; for (int j= 1; j < n; ++j) temp*= x; return temp; }
The number of multiplications performed is n – 1.
We will see that a recursive algorithm provides a much faster solution.
Faster algorithm is crucial for RSA encryption algorithm.
Idea behind the algorithm
Rule of exponents:
xn = (x2)n/2 if n is even x * (x2)(n-1)/2 if n is odd
• base case n = 1 return x
• even n call exp(x*x , n/2) and return the result.
• odd n call exp(x*x, (n – 1)/2) and multiply the result of call by x and return the product.
Code for recursive exponent algorithm
int exp (int x, int n) { if (n == 1) return x; else if (n%2 == 0) return exp(x*x, n/2); else return x* exp(x*x, (n – 1)/2);}
Fact: When called to compute exp(x,100000), the iterative algorithm performs 99999 multiplications while the recursive algorithm will performs 21 multiplications.
Recursion with an array input
Given two segments of sorted arrays A and B, output the result of merging them as a single sorted array.
A B
merge(A, 2, 3, B, 9, 13) should return
1 2 2 3 4 4 5
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
merge(A, 2, 2, B, 9,10) should return the array 1 2 4
merge(A, 3, 4, B, 9, 8) should return 5 7 since the second array is empty. (high index < low index means the array is empty.)
What are the base cases?
• one array segment is empty.
In this case, what is the output?
• The other array segment, so we just have to copy the segment to the output.
What are the base cases?
• one array segment is empty.
In this case, what is the output?
• The other array segment, so we just have to copy the segment to the output.
• what if both segments are not empty? We need to make recursive call.
• Before we proceed, we need to make a change to the prototype of the function merge. Why?
• We need to add two more parameters - the name of the array and the starting index in the output array at which we want to write.
merge(A, low1,high1, B, low2, high2, C, low)
A B
merge(A, 9, 13, B, 2, 3, C, 0)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Case 1: A[low1] < B[low2]
Example:
1 2 2 3 4 4 5C
merge(A, low1,high1, B, low2, high2, C,low)
A B
merge(A, 9, 13, B, 2, 3, C, 0)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Case 1: A[low1] < B[low2]
Example:
1 2 2 3 4 4 5
Step1: move A[low1] to C[low].
Now a recursive call to merge will get the rest of the job done.
What call?
merge(A, low1,high1, B, low2, high2, C, low)
A B
merge(A, 9, 13, B, 2, 3, C, 0)
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
Case 1: A[low1] < B[low2]
Example:
1 2 2 3 4 4 5
Step1: move A[low1] to C[low].
Now a recursive call to merge will get the rest of the job done.
What call? merge(A, low1+1, high1, B, low2,high2, C, low + 1)
Case 2: A[low1] > B[low2].
Move B[low2] to C[low] and make a recursive call to
merge(A,low1, high1, B, low2+1, high2, C, low+1)
The complete code is shown below:
void merge(int A[], int low1, int high1, int B[], int low2,int high2, int C[], int low) {
if (high1 < low1) copy(B, low2, high2, C,low); else if (high2 < low2) copy(A, low1, high1, C,low); else if (A[low1] < B[low2]) {C[low] = A[low1]; merge(A,low1+1, high1, B, low2, high2, C,low + 1);} else {C[low] = B[low2]; merge(A,low1, high1, B, low2+1, high2, C,low + 1); } }
void copy(int A[], int s, int t, int B[], int s1) { for (int j= s; j<= t; ++j)
B[s1 +j - s] = A[j];
}
Last example: recursion and a linked list.
Suppose we want to insert a key x as a last item of a list.
a k g c
x = ‘b’
a k g c
b