problem involving matrix & binary search tree

Question

Hii am a new guy on this forum.I have only recently taken to C# programming and facing a few problems.I hope to get some help here and get to know some people. My present problem looks like this:- I have a 5x5 Matrix. Each cell consists a string value ex: URL of any website. I want to find out which string value occurs( i.e. repeats ) maximum no. of times in the matrix. I have a hint that BINARY SEARCH TREE will be used here and that NODE class in c# may be used to implement trees. The output can be in the form of array/matrix/Binary Search Tree etc. I am not allowed to use unsafe block to create/access trees.

Matthew Cochran · Answer

A binary search tree seems like a pretty sophisticated data structure to use to solve this problem when it can be done with some simple iterations. For example: given the following 5X5 matrix String [][] matrix = new String [][] { new String []{ A  B  C  D  E } new String []{ F  G  H  I  J } new String []{ A  B  C  C  D } new String []{ F  G  H  H  H } new String []{ A  B  H  D  E } }; ----------------------- ----------------------- ----------------------- You'll have to visit each cell whatever solution you go with so why not use a dictionary to count all occurances like this: Dictionary String  Int32 > counter = new Dictionary String  Int32 >(); // count the instances and put them in the dictionary foreach ( String [] strArray in matrix) foreach ( String str in strArray) if (counter.ContainsKey(str)) // if it is there increment the count counter[str]++; else counter.Add(str 1); // if it is not there add it ----------------------- ----------------------- ----------------------- Then you have a couple options to get the string with the most instances. One way is through a simple iterative comparison: KeyValuePair String  Int32 > result = new KeyValuePair string  int >(   -1); foreach ( KeyValuePair String  Int32 > kvp in counter) { if (result.Value result = kvp; } Console .WriteLine(result.Key + :  + result.Value); ----------------------- ----------------------- ----------------------- Your other option would be to use LINQ syntax: // using LINQ: It is a convienient and concise // syntax for querying collections KeyValuePair String  Int32 > biggest = ( from x in counter.AsQueryable() orderby x.Value descending select x) .First(); Console .WriteLine(biggest.Key + :  + biggest.Value); ----------------------- ----------------------- ----------------------- Hope this helps -Matt