How to delete a linked list without recursion? - c++

Question

I'm trying to find a way of deleting a linked list without recursion, because a stack overflow isn't really something nice.
I have a struct as follows:
typedef struct _my_Item
{
_my_Item(const std::string& name)
{
m_name = name;
}
~my_Item()
{
delete next; // this recursively deletes the "tail" of the list
next = NULL;
}
struct _my_Item *next;
std::string m_name;
// ... More members here...
}
In some piece of code (not relevant here) I'm constructing a list from a data file using the above structure. I keep the pointer to the head of the list in a variable and can work with it. All fine.
When I finally call the destructor on the head of the list, the destructor gets called and the delete next; causes a recursion to delete the "tail" of the list (which is the entire list without the first element). Now since the list is quite long, I see a stack overflow sometimes.
Is there a nice way to get around this problem?

Answer 1

~my_Item()
{
while (next)
{
_my_Item* item = next;
next = item->next;
item->next = NULL; // this prevents the recursion
delete item;
}
}

Answer 2

Create a class representing the list itself that will encapsulate nodes deletion in its destructor via a for/while loop. Doing it the way you do leaves the possibility to delete part of the list and leave dangling pointer.

Answer 3

One suggestion would be to remove the delete code from the destructor and use a pointer to delete the list.
struct _my_Item * nodeToDelete = NULL;
while(firstNode != NULL)
{
nodeToDelete = firstNode;
firstNode = firstNode->next;
delete nodeToDelete;
}

Answer 4

// I wrote this java code to delete a node from BST
// I only used one recursion call to remove successor
public Boolean delete(int data){
if(isEmpty() || !search(data))
return false;
return delete(null,root,data);
}
public Boolean delete(Node parent,Node temp,int data) {
while(true){
if(data == temp.getData()) {
break;
} else if(data < temp.getData()) {
parent = temp;
temp = temp.getLeft();
} else {
parent = temp;
temp = temp.getRight();
}
}
if(parent == null && (temp.getLeft() == null || temp.getRight() == null)){
if(temp.getLeft() == null)
root = temp.getRight();
else
root = temp.getLeft();
} else if(temp.getLeft() == null || temp.getRight() == null) {
if (parent.getLeft() == temp) {
if (temp.getLeft() == null)
parent.setLeft(temp.getRight());
else
parent.setLeft(temp.getLeft());
} else if (parent.getRight() == temp) {
if (temp.getLeft() == null)
parent.setRight(temp.getRight());
else
parent.setRight(temp.getLeft());
}
}else{
int min = findMin(temp.getRight());
temp.setData(min);
delete(temp,temp.getRight(),min);
}
return true;
}