Day 1: What is a Data Structure?

After reading this chapter and engaging in the embedded activities and reflections, you should be able to:

• Define data structures through concrete array examples
• Demonstrate basic Java syntax for arrays and fundamental operations
• Implement linear search algorithm step-by-step
• Implement selection sort algorithm step-by-step
• Define algorithms through implemented examples
• Analyze best-case and worst-case performance of linear/binary search and selection sort
• Apply binary search algorithm iteratively
• Implement array shuffling algorithm
• Explain arrays as abstractions for mathematical structures
• Analyze memory representation of arrays in computer systems