Introduction

Stacks and queues are abstract data types that play a critical role in data handling and management in software development. Although often used interchangeably with the term "data structures," it's important to distinguish that stacks and queues specify how operations are performed on the data rather than the structure of the data itself. For practical implementation, these types can be built using various underlying data structures like linked lists, arrays, or dynamically resizing arrays.

Core Characteristics

• Linear structure: Both stacks and queues allow sequential traversal of elements, but only one element is directly accessible at any time.
• Operational efficiency: Adding and removing elements are typically O(1) operations, making them highly efficient for certain computational tasks.
• Controlled access: The limited access to elements (only one end of the structure is accessible) simplifies control over data flow, which can be advantageous in many scenarios.

In the following assignments, we will explore stacks and queues in much more detail and demonstrate how we could implement them using singly-linked lists.