Recursive DFS into Iterative DFS with global state

Question

Here is this graph algorithm that finds a path between two nodes in a DAG.

from typing import *
def find_path(graph: List[List[int]], start: int, end: int) -> List[int]:
    path = []
    def dfs(node):
        path.append(node)
        if node == end: return True
        for neighbor in graph[node]:
            if dfs(neighbor): return True
            path.pop()
        return False

    dfs(start)
    return path

I was wondering if this code could be turned into an iterative DFS.

Here is a sample input:

graph = [[1,2],[3],[3],[]]
start = 0
end = 3
find_path(graph, start, end)

Answer 1

You could stack the node together with an iterator object that iterates its neighbors. Since your original code does not use visited flags (to avoid revisiting the same node), I will not use them here either:

def find_path(graph: List[List[int]], start: int, end: int) -> List[int]:
    stack = [[start, iter(graph[start])]]
    while stack:
        neighbor = next(stack[-1][1], None)
        if neighbor:
            stack.append([neighbor, iter(graph[neighbor])])
            if neighbor == end:
                return [node for node, _ in stack]
        else:
            stack.pop()

Answer 2

Iteration requires a stack:

#  from https://stackoverflow.com/a/39376201/1911064
def dfs_paths(graph, start, goal):
    stack = [(start, [start])]
    visited = set()
    while stack:
        (vertex, path) = stack.pop()
        if vertex not in visited:
            if vertex == goal:
                return path
            visited.add(vertex)
            for neighbor in graph[vertex]:
                stack.append((neighbor, path + [neighbor]))
 
graph = [[1,2],[3],[3],[]]
start = 0
end = 3
path = dfs_paths(graph, start, end)

for i in path:
    print(i)

Here, stack entries are tuples combining a vertex and a partial path. Whenever a new node is pushed on the stack, the partial path of the previous node is extended by the new node.

---

Alternative with reduced memory consumption:

def dfs_paths(graph, start, goal):
    stack = [start]
    predecessor = [-1 for i in len(graph)]
    visited = set()
    while stack:
        vertex = stack.pop()        
        if vertex not in visited:
            if vertex == goal:
                return path
            visited.add(vertex)
            for neighbor in graph[vertex]:
                predecessor[neighbor] = vertex
                stack.append(neighbor)
    return predecessor