Cracking the Coding Interview, 4 Edition - 150 Programming Interview Questions and Solutions

Solutions to Chapter 2 | Linked Lists
2.3 Implement an algorithm to delete a node in the middle of a single linked list, given
only access to that node.
EXAMPLE
SOLUTION
Input: the node ‘c’ from the linked list a->b->c->d->e
Result: nothing is returned, but the new linked list looks like a->b->d->e
pg 50
The solution to this is to simply copy the data from the next node into this node and then
delete the next node.
NOTE: This problem can not be solved if the node to be deleted is the last node
in the linked list. That’s ok—your interviewer wants to see you point that out. You
could consider marking it as dummy in that case. This is an issue you should discuss
with your interviewer.
1 public static boolean deleteNode(LinkedListNode n) {
2 if (n == null || n.next == null) {
3 return false; // Failure
4 }
5 LinkedListNode next = n.next;
6 n.data = next.data;
7 n.next = next.next;
8 return true;
9 }
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Cracking the Coding Interview | Data Structures