Question

I’m having trouble reversing my doublely linked deque list (with only a back sentinel) in C, I’m approaching it by switching the pointers and here is the code I have so far:

/* Reverse the deque

 param:  q  pointer to the deque
 pre: q is not null and q is not empty
 post:  the deque is reversed
*/
/* reverseCirListDeque */
void reverseCirListDeque(struct cirListDeque *q)
{
 struct DLink *back = q->backSentinel;
 struct DLink *second = q->backSentinel->prev;
 struct DLink *third = q->backSentinel->next;

 while (second != q->backSentinel->next){
  back->next = second;
  third = back->prev;
  back->next->prev = back;
  back = second;
  second = third;
 }
}

But it doesn’t seem to work, I’ve been testing it with a deque that looks like this: 1, 2, 3
The output is: 3 and this process seems to mess up the actual value of the numbers. ie. 2 becomes 2.90085e-309… I think the pointer switching is messed up but I cannot find the problem. And even though it doesn’t mean my code is correct; it compiles fine.

Answer 1

If it’s a doubly linked list, you shouldn’t need to change any pointers at all. Just swap over the payloads:

pointer1 = first
pointer2 = last
while pointer1 != pointer2 and pointer2->next != pointer1:
    temp = pointer1->payload
    pointer1->payload = pointer2->payload
    pointer2->payload = temp
    pointer1 = pointer1->next
    pointer2 = pointer2->prev

If by back sentinel you mean the last pointer (as in no first pointer is available), then you need to step backwards throw the deque to find it. It’s hard to believe however that this would be the case since it would be a fairly inefficient deque (which is supposed to be a double ended queue).