Array Data Structure

Why Trust Techopedia

What Does Array Data Structure Mean?

An array data structure is a fundamental element of computer programming that creates collections of individual elements, each of which has its own array index or key. Arrays are handy ways to store various bits of group information in nearly any common programming language.

Advertisements

Techopedia Explains Array Data Structure

To understand an array, let us take a look at an example in Microsoft Visual Basic. First, the array would be dimensioned as something like “a – 1 to 10.”

After that, the user would access, amend, change or identify the contents of this array using the array tag “a” followed by number inferences: a(1), a(2), etc.

The array is basically a shorthand for keeping the collection of data objects. Rather than dimensioning each one as a dynamic variable, one can just create the entire array and then fill those boxes with variables. This type of naming convention is very common and can even be used in new artificial intelligence and machine learning structures that are dealing with enormous volumes of data. For example, instead of creating a thousand different variables, the array size can be enlarged to fit all of those variable values into one collection or group.

Advertisements

Related Terms

Margaret Rouse
Technology expert
Margaret Rouse
Technology expert

Margaret is an award-winning writer and educator known for her ability to explain complex technical topics to a non-technical business audience. Over the past twenty years, her IT definitions have been published by Que in an encyclopedia of technology terms and cited in articles in the New York Times, Time Magazine, USA Today, ZDNet, PC Magazine, and Discovery Magazine. She joined Techopedia in 2011. Margaret’s idea of ​​a fun day is to help IT and business professionals to learn to speak each other’s highly specialized languages.