Graphs
Depth-First Search (Recursive)
Visit a start vertex, then recurse into its first unvisited neighbour all
the way down before backtracking. A visited set prevents revisiting, and
neighbour insertion order fixes the visit sequence.
Algorithm
On the canonical 6-vertex graph from graph-adjacency-list, starting at
vertex 1, the deterministic visit order is [1, 2, 4, 3, 5, 6]. Calls unwind
6 -> 5 -> 4 -> 3 -> 2 -> 1 after all vertices are visited.
Basic Implementation
basic.ts
const adj: Map<number, number[]> = new Map([
[1, [2, 3]],
[2, [1, 4]],
[3, [1, 4]],
[4, [2, 3, 5]],
[5, [4, 6]],
[6, [5]],
]);
const visited: Set<number> = new Set();
const order: number[] = [];
function dfs(v: number): void {
visited.add(v);
order.push(v);
for (const nb of adj.get(v)!) {
if (!visited.has(nb)) {
dfs(nb);
}
}
}
dfs(1);
console.log(JSON.stringify(order));
Complexity
- Time: O(V + E)
- Space: O(V) recursion depth
Implementation notes
- TypeScript: a recursive
dfscloses over the sharedvisitedSet andorderarray. - The replay shows the current vertex, the visited set, and the running visit order after each entry, matching the lesson spec.
recursive descent
Follow one branch to its end, then unwind and try the next neighbour.