删除单个链表中间的节点

Question

I have written a program that removes a node in the single linkedlist given the node.

public class Solution {
    /**
     * @param node: the node in the list should be deleted
     * @return: nothing
     */
    public void deleteNode(ListNode node) {
        // write your code here
        // if node.next==null, we cannot delete the current node without given the previous node
        if(node == null || node.next == null) return;
        ListNode next = node.next;
        node.val = next.val;
        node.next = next.next;
        // I wonder if this link needs to be removed as well
        next.next = null;        
    }
}

The problem is pretty simple. However, many code samples online do not contain this line I wrote:

        next.next = null;        

Without this line, we already remove the node. After that, although nothing is pointing to "next", "next" still points to next.next. Without setting next.next = null, will the Java garbage collector remove this deleted node?

Answer 1

Indeed it will. The gc iterates over all objects and checks wether someone else points to it. If not, it is marked for deletion.