What is the Heaps in DSA?
Heaps in DSA are the specialized tree based Data Structure which is used for satisfy the heap property and making them particularly useful for implementing priority queues and efficient sorting algorithms such as Heap Sort.
Heap are Binary Trees, which means each node has at most two children, and they come in two main types: max-heap and min-heaps.
Applications of Heaps
- Priority Queues: – Heaps are often to implement priority queues, where elements are removed based on priority (highest priority first in max-heap, lowest priority first in min-heap).
- Heap Sort: – A Comparison-based sorting algorithm that uses the Data Structure to sort elements efficiently. The process involves building a heap from the input data and repeatedly extracting the maximum or minimum elements.
- Graphs Algorithms: – Heaps are used in algorithms like Dijkstra’s and Prim’s for efficiently finding the shortest path and minimum spanning tree, respectively.
Operations on Heaps
- Insertion: – Insertion is used for Insert the new element at the end of the tree. Compare the inserted element with its parent; if the heap property is violated, swap the elements. Repeat the process until the heap property is restored.
- Deletion: – Replace the root with the last element in the tree. Compare the new root with its children; if the heap property is violated, swap the elements with the larger child in max-heap or smaller child in min-heap.
- Heapify: – Convert an arbitrary array into a heap by iteratively applying the heap property from the bottom up.