Comparing Leaf and Root Insertion

We consider two ways of inserting a key into a binary search tree: leaf insertion which is the standard method, and root insertion which involves additional rotations. Although the respective cost of constructing leaf and root insertion binary search trees trees, in terms of comparisons, are the s...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Jaco Geldenhuys, Brink van der Merwe
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: South African Institute of Computer Scientists and Information Technologists 2010-07-01
Series:South African Computer Journal
Subjects:
Online Access:http://sacj.cs.uct.ac.za/index.php/sacj/article/view/21
Description
Summary:We consider two ways of inserting a key into a binary search tree: leaf insertion which is the standard method, and root insertion which involves additional rotations. Although the respective cost of constructing leaf and root insertion binary search trees trees, in terms of comparisons, are the same in the average case, we show that in the worst case the construction of a root insertion binary search tree needs approximately 50% of the number of comparisons required by leaf insertion.
ISSN:1015-7999
2313-7835