The process of collecting and organizing data in the best way is known as Data Structures. Here the operations on data are performed in an efficient way. Its functionality supports a specific purpose of accessing and performing operations in a given appropriate ways.
There are mainly two types of data structure:
Primitive Data Structures.
Abstract Data Structure
Primitive Data Structures: integer, boolean, float, long, char, etc. are known as primitive data types. Primitive Data Structures is the concept or technique of handling these types of primitive data types in an efficient way.
Abstract Data Structure: In programming and businesses, we also have to use data types such as stack, linked list, graph, queue, tree, etc. These kinds of data types are known as complex data types. Abstract Data Structure is the technique or concept of handling the connected, complex, and large amount of data in an efficient way.
There are two types of Abstract Data Structures
Stacks: It is used to add or remove objects or files in memory in a particular order. The order is generally known as LIFO, i.e., Last In First Out. Whenever we add an element into the stack, it goes on the top of the existing element. Here we can only remove the element that is on the top of the stack. You can think of the stack as the pile of objects or files. Here we can’t remove the first inserted object without removing out the rest of the objects on its top.
Queue: Queue follows an order of inserting and removing of elements known as FIFO, i.e., First In First Out. It is also known as a linear data structure. Here there are 2 ends for a queue. First element is inserted into the queue from one end called REAR which is also called the tail, and the deletion or removal of the existing element can be done through the other end which is also known as the head.
Here its functionality is that the element that is entered first is the element that has to be removed first. Enqueue is the process of adding an object into the queue, whereas Dequeue is the process of removing an existing object from the queue. You can think of a group of people standing in a queue for tickets as an example of Queue data structure.
What is the need of Data structures in today’s world of technology?
There are different types of data structures where each of them is meant for some special task.
Data structures have gained its importance for the following reasons:
1. In software design, Data structures are known to be major factors for collection, storing and organizing of data rather than algorithms in some programming languages.
2. In almost every software system and program, Data structures are often included now-a-days.
3. Often Data structures are used in the combination of algorithms. This allows the management of large amounts of data in an efficient way.
It is highly being used in the field of computer science and businesses.