是否有名称删除双向链表边缘的一半？

Question

Note: This isn't specific to Java/C/C++, but linked lists being as common as they are, I opted to tag it under those languages as well as doubly-linked-lists. If that's wrong, I can change it!

Let's say you have a standard doubly link list implementation:

struct List {
    int Number;
    struct List *blink;
    struct List *flink;
};

and that you have the following list:

1 <--> 2 <--> 3 <--> 4 <--> 5

Now, in my case, I've been using the flink as a terminator of sorts, and unlinking nodes in a single direction:

1 <--> 2 <--> 3 <--| 4 <--> 5

So 3's flink is null , but 4's blink points to 3.

(Mildly unrelated, I've been doing this to allow for quick modification and restoration of linked lists, and have things like:

1 <--> 2 <--| 3 <--> 4 <--> 5
         <--> 6 <--| 7 <--> 8
                <--> 9 <--> 10 <--> 11

to build a list of 1 2 6 9 10 11 )

My question is really just "does this type of operation have a well defined name?" I've been calling it "shearing", but if there's a real name that'd be nice to know.

Answer 1

It is a kind of messy thing with doubly linked list. It is basically deleting nodes in an improper way.

Why I am saying it improper is, consider nodes 2 & 6, 2's flink is null and 6's blink points to 2.

By this you are telling 2 is the last node and 2 is in the back of 6. This is contradiction.

Where do you need this kind of approach?

Answer 2

Well, unless you're also saving the pointers to the nodes 3, 4, 5, 7, and 8 then this would be called a "memory leak".

ie allocated memory you no longer have a way of accessing and therefore freeing.