Time & Space Complexity

Tips & Tricks for the preparation of examination

Merge sort is a divide-and-conquer algorithm based on the idea of breaking down a list into several sub-lists until each sublist consists of a single element and merging those sublists in a manner that results into a sorted list.

Insertion sort is the sorting mechanism where the sorted array is built having one item at a time. The array elements are compared with each other sequentially and then arranged simultaneously in some particular order. This sort works on the principle of inserting an element at a particular position, hence the name Insertion Sort. The first step involves the comparison of the element in question with its adjacent element. And if at every comparison reveals that the element in question can be inserted at a particular position, then space is created for it by shifting the other elements one position to the right and inserting the element at the suitable position. The above procedure is repeated until all the element in the array is at their apt position.

Time complexity of an algorithm quantifies the amount of time taken by an algorithm to run as a function of the length of the input. Similarly, Space complexity of an algorithm quantifies the amount of space or memory taken by an algorithm to run as a function of the length of the input.

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