Implementation Issues
In actual implementation, rather than a pure recursive function (single check for base case, otherwise recursive step), a number of modifications may be made, for purposes of clarity or efficiency. These include:
- Wrapper function (at top)
- Short-circuiting the base case, aka "Arm's-length recursion" (at bottom)
- Hybrid algorithm (at bottom) – switching to a different algorithm once data is small enough
On the basis of elegance, wrapper functions are generally approved, while short-circuiting the base case is frowned on, particularly in academia. Hybrid algorithms are often used for efficiency, to reduce the overhead of recursion in small cases, and arm's-length recursion is a special case of this.
Read more about this topic: Recursion (computer Science)
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