ARRAYS

Array is a data structure which holds same type of fixed number of data elements . Most of the other data structures like stack or queue make use of arrays to implement their algorithms .

Important terms in arrays : 1. Element : Each item stored in an array is called an element .

2.Index: Each location of an element in an array has a numerical index, which is used to identify the element.

Array declaration : In C , array is declared as below example .

array representation

Array can be declared in different ways in different languages .

illustration of an array

Important points to be considered are :

1. Index starts with 0 . (not 1 )
2. In above example , array length is 10 , since it can store 10 elements .
3. Each element can be accessed using it’s index . ( array[5] is element stored at index 5 in array , which is 19 )

Basic operations on an array :

1. Insertion : Adding elements in an array at a given index.
2. Deletion : Deletes elements in an array at a given index .
3. Search : Searches an elements using either index or value .
4. Traverse : Printing all elements in an array one by one .
5. Update : Update an element at the given index .

When an array is initialized with size , then it assigns default values as 0 for all data types , false for boolean data type , and null for object type .

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Advantages of an Array:

• We can put in place other data structures like stacks, queues, linked lists, trees, graphs, etc. in Array.
• Arrays can sort multiple elements at a time.
• We can access an element of Array by using an index.

Disadvantages of an Array :

• We have to declare Size of an array in advance. However, we may not know what size we need at the time of array declaration.
• The array is static structure. It means array size is always fixed, so we cannot increase or decrease memory allocation.

This is the introduction of Arrays .