Can multiple stacked be housed in a single array?
A simple way to implement k stacks is to divide the array in k slots of size n/k each, and fix the slots for different stacks, i.e., use arr[0] to arr[n/k-1] for first stack, and arr[n/k] to arr[2n/k-1] for stack2 where arr[] is the array to be used to implement two stacks and size of array be n.
Why is multiple stack required?
An important advantage of having multiple stacks is one of speed. Multiple stacks allow access to multiple values within a clock cycle. As an example, a machine that has simultaneous access to both a data stack and a return address stack can perform subroutine calls and returns in parallel with data operations.
How to implement 3 stack in a single array?
In the above example if you create an array of pointers with size 3, each of the pointer pointing to head, you can create three linked lists. This would handle the space with maximum efficiency and there is no need to check for free nodes too.
How to implement three stacks using a linked list?
You can implement three stacks with a linked list: You need a pointer pointing to the next free element. Three more pointers return the last element of each stack (or null, if the stack is empty).
Can a third stack grow faster than the first two?
The third stack can grow to fill in the whole array at a maximum. Worst case scenario is when one of the first two arrays grows at 50% of the array. Then there is a 50% waste of the array. To optimise the efficiency the third array must be selected to be the one that grows quicker than the other two.
When to split an array into three parts?
Split array in any 3 parts (no matter if you’ll split it sequentially or interleaved). If one stack grows greater than 1/3 of array you start filling ends of rest two stacks from the end. The worse case is when two stacks grows up to 1/3 boundary and then you have 30% of space waste.