Question

void traverse(Node* root)
{
    queue<Node*> q;

    Node* temp_node= root;

    while(temp_node)
    {
        cout<<temp_node->value<<endl;

        if(temp_node->left)
            q.push(temp_node->left);

        if(temp_node->right)
            q.push(temp_node->right);

        if(!q.empty())
        {
            temp_node = q.front();
            q.pop();
        }
        else
            temp_node = NULL;
   }
 }

The above posted code is my level order traversal code. This code works fine for me but One thing I dont like is I am explicitly initializing temp_node = NULL or I use break. But it does not seem to be a good code to me.

Is there a neat implementation than this or how can I make this code better?

Answer 1

void traverse(Node* root)
{
    queue<Node*> q;

    if (root) {
        q.push(root);
    }
    while (!q.empty())
    {
        const Node * const temp_node = q.front();
        q.pop();
        cout<<temp_node->value<<"\n";

        if (temp_node->left) {
            q.push(temp_node->left);
        }
        if (temp_node->right) {
            q.push(temp_node->right);
        }
    }
}

There, no more special case. And the indentation is cleaned up so it can be understood more easily.

Alternatively:

void traverse(Node* root)
{
    queue<Node*> q;

    if (!root) {
        return;
    }
    for (q.push(root); !q.empty(); q.pop()) {
        const Node * const temp_node = q.front();
        cout<<temp_node->value<<"\n";

        if (temp_node->left) {
            q.push(temp_node->left);
        }
        if (temp_node->right) {
            q.push(temp_node->right);
        }
    }
}

Done up as a for loop. Personally, I like the extra variable. The variable name is a nicer shorthand than saying ‘q.front()` all the time.