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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS Q1.What pointer type is used to implement the heterogeneous linked list in C? The answer is the void pointer. The heterogeneous linked list contains different data types in it's nodes and we need a link, pointer, to connect them. Since we can't use ordinary pointers for this, we use the void pointer. Void pointer is a generic pointer type, and capable of storing pointer to any type. Q2.What is the minimum number of queues needed to implement the priority queue? Two. One queue is used for the actual storing of data, and the other one is used for storing the priorities. Q3.Which data structure is used to perform recursion? The answer is Stack. Stack has the LIFO (Last In First Out) property; it remembers it's caller. Therefore, it knows to whom it should return when the function has to return. On the other hand, recursion makes use of the system stack for storing the return addresses of the function calls. Every recursive function has its equivalent iterative (non-recursive) function. Even when such equivalent iterative procedures are written explicit, stack is to be used. Q4.What are some of the applications for the tree data structure? 1- Manipulation of the arithmetic expressions. 2- Symbol table construction. 3- Syntax analysis. Q5. Which data strucutres algorithm used in solving the eight Queens problem? Backtracking Q6. n an AVL tree, at what condition the balancing is to be done? If the "pivotal value", or the "height factor", is greater than one or less than minus one. Q7.What is the bucket size, when the overlapping and collision occur at the same time? The answer is one. If there is only one entry possible in the bucket, when the collision occurs, there is no way to accommodate the colliding value. This results in the overlapping of values. Q8.There are 8, 15, 13, and 14 nodes in four different trees. Which one of them can form a full binary tree? The answer is the tree with 15 nodes. In general, there are 2^n-1 nodes in a full binary tree. By the method of elimination: Full binary trees contain odd number of nodes, so there cannot be full binary trees with 8 or 14 nodes. Moreover, with 13 nodes you can form a complete binary tree but not a full

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS binary tree. Thus, the correct answer is 15. Q9 . Consider the following list of integers: 5, 54, 125, 105, 25, 104, 20, 100, 50, 159 (a) Slightly modify the integers above so that it is appropriate to perform a radix sort on the above list. Solution: Radix sort only applies to integers that have the same number of digits (or strings that have the same number of characters). For these integers, we fill in initial 0s so that each integer has 3 digits: 005, 054, 125, 105, 025, 104, 020, 100, 050, 159
Q10 .f(n) is of the order of g(n) if there exist positive integers a and b such that A) f(n) <= a * g(n) for all n >= b B) f(n) <= a * g(n) for all n <= b C) g(n) <= a * f(n) for all n >= b D) None of the above Q11. Adjacency matrix for a digraph is A) unit matrix B) symmetric C) asymmetric matrix D) none of the above Q12 .Which of the following data structure may give overflow error, even though the current number of elements in it, is less than its size A) simple queue B) circular queue C) stack D) none of the above Q13 .Which of the following types of expressions does not require precedence rules for evaluation? A) Fully parenthesized infix expression B) Partially parenthesized infix expression C) Both A) and B) D) Prefix expression Q14 If j=2, m=1, x=3, y=4. What is the value of the expression j++ = = m = = y * x A) 0 B) 1 Q15. The time complexity of the Depth First Search algorithm to traverse a graph of n vertices and e edges is:

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
A) O (n) if the graph is represented by adjacency matrix. B) O (n) if the graph is represented by adjacency list. C) O (e) if the graph is represented by adjacency list. D) None of the above

Q16 Given 2 sorted lists of size m and n respectively. The number of comparisons needed in the worst case by merge sort will be A) m*n B) Max ( m, n) C) Min (m, n) D) m + n 1 Q17 A complete binary tree with 10 leaves A) cannot have more than 19 nodes B) has exactly19 nodes C) has exactly 17 nodes D) cannot have more than 17 nodes Q18 What is Linked List ? Linked List is one of the fundamental data structures. It consists of a sequence of? nodes, each containing arbitrary data fields and one or two (?links?) pointing to the next and/or previous nodes. A linked list is a self-referential data type because it contains a pointer or link to another data of the same type. Linked lists permit insertion and removal of nodes at any point in the list in constant time, but do not allow random access. Q19 .What is Heap data structure? Heap is a binary tree with a property that parent node is largest or smallest of its subtree. It is balanced and almost complete binary tree. It is mostly implemented using array reprentation of binary tree. It is used for sorting arrays. It has order of N*logN. It have consistant performance unlike quick short. It is slower than quick short by twice in normal case. Q20. Define an addressing function for a data structure? An addressing function for a data structure consisting of n elements is a function which maps the ith element of the data structure onto an integer between one and n. In the case of a vector, the addressing function f maps the ith element onto the integer (i). Q21 . How do you define a vector for a data structure?. The simplest data structure that makes use of computed address to locate its elements is

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS the one ? dimensional array and is called as a vector. Q22 . Difference b/w calloc & malloc? malloc: allocate n bytes calloc: allocate m times n bytes initialized to 0 Q23 .How is any Data Structure application is classified among files? A linked list application can be organized into a header file, source file and main application file. The first file is the header file that contains the definition of the NODE structure and the LinkedList class definition. The second file is a source code file containing the implementation of member functions of the LinkedList class. The last file is the application file that contains code that creates and uses the LinkedList class Q24.What is data structure? A data structure is a way of organizing data that considers not only the items stored, but also their relationship to each other. Advance knowledge about the relationship between data items allows designing of efficient algorithms for the manipulation of data. Q25 List out the areas in which data structures are applied extensively? _ Compiler Design, _ Operating System, _ Database Management System, _ Statistical analysis package, _ Numerical Analysis, _ Graphics, _ Artificial Intelligence, _ Simulation Q26.What are the major data structures used in the following areas : RDBMS, Network data model & Hierarchical data model. _ RDBMS Array (i.e. Array of structures) _ Network data model Graph Hierarchical data model Trees Q27 .If you are using C language to implement the heterogeneous linked list, what pointer type will you use? The heterogeneous linked list contains different data types in its nodes and we need a link, pointer to connect them. It is not possible to use ordinary pointers for this. So we go for void pointer. Void pointer is capable of storing pointer to any type as it is a generic pointer type.

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS Q28.Minimum number of queues needed to implement the priority queue? Two. One queue is used for actual storing of data and another for storing priorities. Q29.What is the data structures used to perform recursion? Stack. Because of its LIFO (Last In First Out) property it remembers its caller so knows whom to return when the function has to return. Recursion makes use of system stack for storing the return addresses of the function calls. Every recursive function has its equivalent iterative (non-recursive) function. Even when such equivalent iterative procedures are written, explicit stack is to be used. Q30 .What are the notations used in Evaluation of Arithmetic Expressions using prefix and postfix forms? Polish and Reverse Polish notations. Q31 .Convert the expression ((A + B) * C (D E) ^ (F + G)) to equivalent Prefix and Postfix notations. Prefix Notation: ^ - * +ABC - DE + FG Postfix Notation: AB + C * DE - - FG + ^ Q32..Sorting is not possible by using which of the following methods? (a) Insertion (b) Selection (c) Exchange (d) Deletion Using insertion we can perform insertion sort, using selection we can perform selection sort, using exchange we can perform the bubble sort (and other similar sorting methods). But no sorting method can be done just using deletion. Q33.A binary tree with 20 nodes has null branches? 34 Let us take a tree with 5 nodes (n=5) It will have only 6 (ie,5+1) null branches. In general, A binary tree with n nodes has exactly n+1 null nodes. Q35.What are the methods available in storing sequential files ? _ Straight merging, _ Natural merging, _ Polyphase sort, _ Distribution of Initial runs. Q36.List out few of the Application of tree data-structure? _ The manipulation of Arithmetic expression,

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS _ Symbol Table construction, _ Syntax analysis. Q37.List out few of the applications that make use of Multilinked Structures? _ Sparse matrix, _ Index generation. Q35.In tree construction which is the suitable efficient data structure? (a) Array (b) Linked list (c) Stack (d) Queue (e) none Q36.What is the type of the algorithm used in solving the 8 Queens problem? Backtracking Q37.In an AVL tree, at what condition the balancing is to be done? If the pivotal value (or the Height factor) is greater than 1 or less than 1. Q38.What is the bucket size, when the overlapping and collision occur at same time? One. If there is only one entry possible in the bucket, when the collision occurs, there is no way to accommodate the colliding value. This results in the overlapping of values. Q39.Classify the Hashing Functions based on the various methods by which the key value is found. _ Direct method, _ Subtraction method, _ Modulo-Division method, _ Digit-Extraction method, _ Mid-Square method, _ Folding method, _ Pseudo-random method. Q40 .What are the types of Collision Resolution Techniques and the methods used in each of the type? _ Open addressing (closed hashing), The methods used include: Overflow block, _ Closed addressing (open hashing) The methods used: Linked list, Binary tree

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS Q41.In RDBMS, what is the efficient data structure used in the internal storage representation? B+ tree. Because in B+ tree, all the data is stored only in leaf nodes, that makes searching easier. This corresponds to the records that shall be stored in leaf nodes. Q42.Of the following tree structure, which is, efficient considering space and time complexities? (a) Incomplete Binary Tree (b) Complete Binary Tree (c) Full Binary Tree By the method of elimination: Full binary tree loses its nature when operations of insertions and deletions are done. For incomplete binary trees, extra storage is required and overhead of NULL node checking takes place. So complete binary tree is the better one since the property of complete binary tree is maintained even after operations like additions and deletions are done on it. 46..What is a spanning Tree? A spanning tree is a tree associated with a network. All the nodes of the graph appear on the tree once. A minimum spanning tree is a spanning tree organized so that the total edge weight between nodes is minimized. 47.Does the minimum spanning tree of a graph give the shortest distance between any 2 specified nodes? No. Minimal spanning tree assures that the total weight of the tree is kept at its minimum. But it doesnt mean that the distance between any two nodes involved in the minimum-spanning tree is minimum. 48.Which is the simplest file structure? (a) Sequential (b) Indexed (c) Random (a) Sequential 49.Whether Linked List is linear or Non-linear data structure? According to Access strategies Linked list is a linear one. According to Storage Linked List is a Non-linear one. 50 ..What does each entry in the Link List called? A. Each entry in a linked list is called a node. Think of a node as an entry that has three sub entries. One sub entry contains the data, which may be one attribute or many attributes. Another points to the previous node, and the last points to the next node. When you enter a new item on a linked list, you allocate the new node and then set the pointers to previous and next nodes. 51 . How is the front of the queue calculated ? . The front of the queue is calculated by front = (front+1) % size. 52 Why is the isEmpty() member method called? .

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS The isEmpty() member method is called within the dequeue process to determine if there is an item in the queue to be removed i.e. isEmpty() is called to decide whether the queue has at least one element. This method is called by the dequeue() method before returning the front element. 53. Which process places data at the back of the queue? A. Enqueue is the process that places data at the back of the queue. 54 What is the relationship between a queue and its underlying array? A. Data stored in a queue is actually stored in an array. Two indexes, front and end will be used to identify the start and end of the queue. When an element is removed front will be incremented by 1. In case it reaches past the last index available it will be reset to 0. Then it will be checked with end. If it is greater than end queue is empty. When an element is added end will be incremented by 1. In case it reaches past the last index available it will be reset to 0. After incrementing it will be checked with front. If they are equal queue is full. 55. What method removes the value from the top of a stack? A. The pop() member method removes the value from the top of a stack, which is then returned by the pop() member method to the statement that calls the pop() member method. 56. What method is used to place a value onto the top of a stack? A. push() method, Push is the direction that data is being added to the stack. push() member method places a value onto the top of a stack. 57. Run Time Memory Allocation is known as. A. Allocating memory at runtime is called a dynamically allocating memory. In this,you dynamically allocate memory by using the new operator when declaring the array, for example:int grades[] = new int[10]; 58. How do you assign an address to an element of a pointer array ? A. We can assign a memory address to an element of a pointer array by using the address operator, which is the ampersand (&), in an assignment statement such as ptemployee[0] = &projects[2]; 59 Why do we Use a Multidimensional Array? A. A multidimensional array can be useful to organize subgroups of data within an array. In addition to organizing data stored in elements of an array, a multidimensional array can store memory addresses of data in a pointer array and an array of pointers. Multidimensional arrays are used to store information in a matrix form. 60 What is significance of * ? A. The symbol * tells the computer that you are declaring a pointer. Actually it depends on context. In a statement like int *ptr; the * tells that you are declaring a pointer. In a statement like int i = *ptr; it tells that you want to assign value pointed to by ptr to variable i. The symbol * is also called as Indirection Operator/ Dereferencing Operator

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 61 . Is Pointer a variable? A. Yes, a pointer is a variable and can be used as an element of a structure and as an attribute of a class in some programming languages such as C++, but not Java. 62 . How many parts are there in a declaration statement? A. There are two main parts, variable identifier and data type and the third type is optional which is type qualifier like signed/unsigned. 63 How memory is reserved using a declaration statement ? A. Memory is reserved using data type in the variable declaration. A programming language implementation has predefined sizes for its data types. For example, in C# the declaration int i; will reserve 32 bits for variable i. 64 . What is impact of signed numbers on the memory? A. Sign of the number is the first bit of the storage allocated for that number. So you get one bit less for storing the number. For example if you are storing an 8-bit number, without sign, the range is 0-255. If you decide to store sign you get 7 bits for the number plus one bit for the sign. So the range is -128 to +127 65 What is precision? A. Precision refers the accuracy of the decimal portion of a value. Precision is the number of digits allowed after the decimal point 66 . What is the difference bitween NULL AND VOID pointer? A. NULL can be value for pointer type variables. VOID is a type identifier which has not size. NULL and void are not same. Example: void* ptr = NULL; 67 What is the difference between ARRAY and STACK? A. STACK follows LIFO. Thus the item that is first entered would be the last removed. In array the items can be entered or removed in any order. Basically each member access is done using index. No strict order is to be followed here to remove a particular element. 68 . Tell how to check whether a linked list is circular. A. Create two pointers, each set to the start of the list. Update each as follows: while (pointer1) { pointer1 = pointer1->next; pointer2 = pointer2->next; if (pointer2) pointer2=pointer2->next; if (pointer1 == pointer2) { print (\circular\n\); } } 69. Whether Linked List is linear or Non-linear data structure? A. According to Access strategies Linked list is a linear one. According to Storage Linked List is a Non-linear one 70 What is the data structures used to perform recursion? A. Stack. Because of its LIFO (Last In First Out) property it remembers its caller so

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS knows whom to return when the function has to return. Recursion makes use of system stack for storing the return addresses of the function calls.Every recursive function has its equivalent iterative (non-recursive) function. Even when such equivalent iterative procedures are written, explicit stack is to be used. 71. If you are using C language to implement the heterogeneous linked list, what pointer type will you use? A. The heterogeneous linked list contains different data types in its nodes and we need a link, pointer to connect them. It is not possible to use ordinary pointers for this. So we go for void pointer. Void pointer is capable of storing pointer to any type as it is a generic pointer type. 72 . What is placement new? A. When you want to call a constructor directly, you use the placement new. Sometimes you have some raw memory thats already been allocated, and you need to construct an object in the memory you have. Operator news special version placement new allows you to do it. 73. When can you tell that a memory leak will occur? A. A memory leak occurs when a program loses the ability to free a block of dynamically allocated memory. 74 What is a node class? A. A node class is a class that has added new services or functionality beyond the services inherited from its base class. 75 How many different trees are possible with 10 nodes ? A. 1014 - For example, consider a tree with 3 nodes(n=3), it will have the maximum combination of 5 different (ie, 23 - 3 = 5) 76 . Minimum number of queues needed to implement the priority queue? A. Two. One queue is used for actual storing of data and another for storing priorities. 77 In an AVL tree, at what condition the balancing is to be done? A. If the pivotal value (or the Height factor) is greater than 1 or less than 1. 78 . What is the bucket size, when the overlapping and collision occur at same time? A. One. If there is only one entry possible in the bucket, when the collision occurs, there is no way to accommodate the colliding value. This results in the overlapping of values. 79 . What is the easiest sorting method to use? A. The answer is the standard library function qsort(). Its the easiest sort by far for several reasons: It is already written. It is already debugged. It has been optimized as much as possible (usually). Void qsort(void *buf, size_t num, size_t size, int (*comp)(const void *ele1, const void *ele2)); 80. What is the heap? A. The heap is where malloc(), calloc(), and realloc() get memory. Getting memory from the heap is much slower than getting it from the stack. On the other

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS hand, the heap is much more flexible than the stack. Memory can be allocated at any time and deallocated in any order. Such memory isnt deallocated automatically; you have to call free(). 81. How can I search for data in a linked list? A. Unfortunately, the only way to search a linked list is with a linear search, because the only way a linked lists members can be accessed is sequentially. Sometimes it is quicker to take the data from a linked list and store it in a different data structure so that searches can be more efficient. 82. What is the quickest sorting method to use? A. The answer depends on what you mean by quickest. For most sorting problems, it just doesnt matter how quick the sort is because it is done infrequently or other operations take significantly more time anyway. Even in cases in which sorting speed is of the essence, there is no one answer. It depends on not only the size and nature of the data, but also the likely order. 83. what is quick short? A. The Quick Sort The quick sort algorithm is of the divide and conquer type. That means it works by reducing a sorting problem into several easier sorting problems and solving each of them. A dividing value is chosen from the input data, and the data is partitioned into three sets: elements that belong before the dividing value, the value itself, and elements that come after the dividing value. The partitioning is performed by exchanging elements that are in the first set but belong in the third with elements that are in the third set but belong in the first Elements that are equal to the dividing element can be put in any of the three setsthe algorithm will still work properly. 84. what is merge short? A. The Merge Sort The merge sort is a divide and conquer sort as well. It works by considering the data to be sorted as a sequence of already-sorted lists (in the worst case, each list is one element long). Adjacent sorted lists are merged into larger sorted lists until there is a single sorted list containing all the elements. The merge sort is good at sorting lists and other data structures that are not in arrays, and it can be used to sort things that dont fit into memory. It also can be implemented as a stable sort. 85. what is radix short? A. The Radix Sort The radix sort takes a list of integers and puts each element on a smaller list, depending on the value of its least significant byte. Then the small lists are concatenated, and the process is repeated for each more significant byte until the list is sorted. The radix sort is simpler to implement on fixed-length data such as ints. 86. Does the minimum spanning tree of a graph give the shortest distance between any 2 specified nodes? A. Minimal spanning tree assures that the total weight of the tree is kept at its minimum.

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS But it doesnt mean that the distance between any two nodes involved in the minimumspanning tree is minimum. 87. In RDBMS, what is the efficient data structure used in the internal storage representation? A. B+ tree. Because in B+ tree, all the data is stored only in leaf nodes, that makes searching easier. This corresponds to the records that shall be stored in leaf nodes. 88. List out few of the Application of tree data-structure? A. The manipulation of Arithmetic expression,Symbol Table construction,Syntax analysis 89. What are the methods available in storing sequential files ? A. Straight merging,Natural merging,Polyphase sort,Distribution of Initial runs 90. printf() Function What is the output of printf("%d")? 1. When we write printf("%d",x); this means compiler will print the value of x. But as here, there is nothing after %d so compiler will show in output window garbage value. 2. When we use %d the compiler internally uses it to access the argument in the stack (argument stack). Ideally compiler determines the offset of the data variable depending on the format specification string. Now when we write printf("%d",a) then compiler first accesses the top most element in the argument stack of the printf which is %d and depending on the format string it calculated to offset to the actual data variable in the memory which is to be printed. Now when only %d will be present in the printf then compiler will calculate the correct offset (which will be the offset to access the integer variable) but as the actual data object is to be printed is not present at that memory location so it will print what ever will be the contents of that memory location. 91. malloc() Function- What is the difference between "calloc(...)" and "malloc(...)"? 1. calloc(...) allocates a block of memory for an array of elements of a certain size. By default the block is initialized to 0. The total number of memory allocated will be (number_of_elements * size). malloc(...) takes in only a single argument which is the memory required in bytes. malloc(...) allocated bytes of memory and not blocks of memory like calloc(...). 2. malloc(...) allocates memory blocks and returns a void pointer to the allocated space, or NULL if there is insufficient memory available. calloc(...) allocates an array in memory with elements initialized to 0 and returns a pointer to the allocated space. calloc(...) calls malloc(...) in order to use the C++ _set_new_mode function to set the new handler mode.

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS 92. printf() Function- What is the difference between "printf(...)" and "sprintf(...)"? sprintf(...) writes data to the character array whereas printf(...) writes data to the standard output device. 93. Linked Lists -- Can you tell me how to check whether a linked list is circular? Create two pointers, and set both to the start of the list. Update each as follows: while (pointer1) { pointer1 = pointer1->next; pointer2 = pointer2->next; if (pointer2) pointer2=pointer2->next; if (pointer1 == pointer2) { print ("circular"); }} If a list is circular, at some point pointer2 will wrap around and be either at the item just before pointer1, or the item before that. Either way, its either 1 or 2 jumps until they meet. 94. What is hashing? To hash means to grind up, and thats essentially what hashing is all about. The heart of a hashing algorithm is a hash function that takes your nice, neat data and grinds it into some random-looking integer. The idea behind hashing is that some data either has no inherent ordering (such as images) or is expensive to compare (such as images). If the data has no inherent ordering, you cant perform comparison searches. To search for an item, you simply hash it and look at all the data whose hash values match that of the data youre looking for. This technique greatly lessens the number of items you have to look at. If the parameters are set up with care and enough storage is available for the hash table, the number of comparisons needed to find an item can be made arbitrarily close to one. 95. What is static memory allocation and dynamic memory allocation? Static memory allocation: The compiler allocates the required memory space for a declared variable.By using the address of operator,the reserved address is obtained and this address may be assigned to a pointer variable.Since most of the declared variable have static memory,this way of assigning pointer value to a pointer variable is known as static memory allocation. memory is assigned during compilation time. Dynamic memory allocation: It uses functions such as malloc( ) or calloc( ) to get memory dynamically.If these functions are used to get memory dynamically and the values returned by these functions are

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DATA STRUCTURE INTERVIEW QUESTIONS assingned to pointer variables, such assignments are known as dynamic memory allocation.memory is assined during run time. 96. Difference between arrays and pointers? - Pointers are used to manipulate data using the address. Pointers use * operator to access the data pointed to by them - Arrays use subscripted variables to access and manipulate data. Array variables can be equivalently written using pointer expression. 97. What is an lvalue? An lvalue is an expression to which a value can be assigned. The lvalue expression is located on the left side of an assignment statement, whereas an rvalue is located on the right side of an assignment statement. Each assignment statement must have an lvalue and an rvalue. The lvalue expression must reference a storable variable in memory. It cannot be a constant. 98. What is a void pointer? A void pointer is a C convention for a raw address. The compiler has no idea what type of object a void Pointer really points to. If you write int *ip; ip points to an int. If you write void *p; p doesnt point to a void! In C and C++, any time you need a void pointer, you can use another pointer type. For example, if you have a char*, you can pass it to a function that expects a void*. You dont even need to cast it. In C (but not in C++), you can use a void* any time you need any kind of pointer, without casting. (In C++, you need to cast it). A void pointer is used for working with raw memory or for passing a pointer to an unspecified type. 99. Why should I prototype a function? A function prototype tells the compiler what kind of arguments a function is looking to receive and what kind of return value a function is going to give back. This approach helps the compiler ensure that calls to a function are made correctly and that no erroneous type conversions are taking place. 100. Difference between const char* p and char const* p In const char* p, the character pointed by p is constant, so u cant change the value of character pointed by p but u can make p refer to some other location. in char const* p, the ptr p is constant not the character referenced by it, so u cant make p to reference to any other location but u can change the value of the char pointed by p.