35
2.1.2.6.
General Tree
In
computer
science,
a
technique to
improve
efficiency in
terms
of
storing
and
managing data
is
known
as
data structure. Moreover, data structure can be
further
categorized
into
two
groups,
which
are
linear
data
structure
and
non
linear
data
structure. The difference between
linear data structure and non
linear data
structure
lies
in
the
order
of
data
organization,
in
which
linear
data
structure
is
organized
in
a
sequence,
while
non-linear data
structure
is
organized
in
non-
sequence form.
Tree [14]
is one
of the widely
used data
structure
that
falls
into
the second
category, non-linear data structure. The
main reason
for this
is because its structure
involves
interconnected data by edges
in a hierarchical
manner as it can be viewed
on
figure
2.1.2.6.a.
Tree
is
made
up
of
two
main
components,
which
are
nodes
(vertices) and edges. Node is described as an object with data or information, while
edge is a connector that associates one
node to other nodes. Furthermore, nodes are
perceived
differently according
to
their
depth
(level)
within
a
tree.
Also,
the
associations among
the
nodes can be described
in parent-child relationship.
Before
going
any
further,
there
are
few
terms
of
tree
data
structure that
should
be
acknowledged, such as:
-
Parent: node that is located at a depth and has descendant(s) or successor(s)
in a
depth + 1.
-
Child: node that is located at a depth and has predecessor node at depth -1.
-
Root:
node
that
is
located
at
the
top
most
of
a
tree.
It
is
also
a
“parent”
by
default due to its position.
 |