Subj : Re: Are recursive functions ever needed?
To   : comp.programming
From : John
Date : Sun Oct 02 2005 03:05 pm

"Ben Pfaff" <blp@cs.stanford.edu> wrote in message 
news:87u0g06izs.fsf@benpfaff.org...
> "John" <john@nospam.com> writes:
>
>> "Tatu Portin" <axel86@mbnet.fi> wrote in message
>> news:z%x%e.451$nZ1.352@read3.inet.fi...
>> [snip]
>>> Well, my problem here seems to be lack of good examples where recursion 
>>> is
>>> needed. Would anybody provide some?
>>
>> XML parser.
>> Binary tree.
>> traversing a directory tree
>> web crawler
>
> Recursion isn't *needed* in any of those cases.  For example,
> regarding binary trees, take a look at GNU libavl, which doesn't
> use recursion at all.

By needed .. do you mean is it the only way of doing it?

You're right I'm sure it isn't *needed*.  But IMHO, it's definitely the 
simplest solution to those problems.

.