150 WORD ARTICLE

Why Depth First Searches Can Be Dangerous Yet Inspirational [XVI]

Or… Whilst the term is generally used in technology circles, it can also cause spirals in life as well

Image by Author :)

Depth Or Breadth

Tree structures are a common data structure used in computer science. The common ways of enumerating items in a tree are either depth-first or breadth-first.

Here is a diagram (which is cheating a bit to keep the word count down).

See these comics for a humourous take on the dangers: Depth and Breadth, or perhaps DFS.

For me, a depth-first search works wonders for my inspiration — here is how I got to this article:

• I wanted to quote from a book
• Short form article format as I just wanted to get my point across

Wondered about

• why I couldn’t just copy and paste the quote
• the fair use doctrine

Which got me thinking of

• depth-first searches