Things you must know about Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG)



If you’ve spent time on cryptocurrency, then you’ll probably know how various terminologies get created every now and then. 

Just like how the decentralized world is growing, the cryptocurrency field is also rapidly evolving.


While cryptocurrency is said to be advancing, there are still major problems that keep arising. It is in these situations, programmers make use of directed acyclic graphs to solve the crypto errors.


Directed acyclic graph is a combination of linked lists, trees and graphs but it directly comes under the category of linked list cycle ii. 


Now, let us have a keen look at all the terminologies around Directed acyclic graphs to understand how intriguing and important this concept is.


 Let’s zone in.



What is a linked list cycle ii?


A linked list is basically a list where each node connects one another. In a linked list cycle ii, there will be a process where each node connects each other not in a loop but in an order that can’t be reversed. Similarly, directed acyclic graph is also done but it isn’t just a linked list but also a graph and a sorting type.



What is Directed Acyclic Graph?


A directed acyclic graph is a type of a graph that connects with other edges without the use of a cycle. Once the edges get connected, we cannot reverse the graph’s pointers to any edge. This indicates that the pointers of the graph go only in one route and can’t return back to its starting edge. Additionally this one-way route connection signifies topological sorting where every node is arranged in a particular order.


When we take the graph theory, we know that a graph is a sequence of vertextes that uses the edges to connect. Whereas in a directed graph, all the edges link in an order where the route goes only one way. 

To simply sum it up, a directed acyclic graph uses edges to connect, doesn’t have a cyclic routine and so every edge connects only in one way and can’t be traversed.


Properties Of Directed Acyclic Graph

The Directed Acyclic Graph has certain key properties to take a note of for better understanding and they are:


  • Every node carries a value that stands unique. Interior nodes can have operators while exterior nodes have constants, identifiers, etc.

  • The term “acyclic” simply denotes that there isn’t a cycle. Even when it is considered to not have cycles, it still comes under the linked list cycle ii as directed acyclic graphs denote the characteristics of a linked list.

  • The term “directed” signifies that the edges of the graph go in an arrow-like route and can’t travel back. Every node that gets connected forms a relationship.

  • Basic blocks can be easily optimized by directed acyclic graphs.

  • There won’t be a need to re-calculate the found sub-expressions. This simply means, the graph won’t check again whether all the nodes carry a unique value or not.

  • The assignment operations won’t be computed unless and until a valid reason arises.

  • For a directed acyclic graph to be executed properly, the two variables that share a cause must be included.

  • For directed acyclic graphs, transitive closure and reduction gets perfectly defined.

  • With the help of directed acyclic graphs, topological orderings are declared.

  • An operator symbol is assigned to each interior node in the graph.

  • Moreover, each node is given an identifier string to be utilized as labels so that one can save calculated values.



How useful are the directed acyclic graphs?


To present flows and its various types seamlessly, we inculcate directed acyclic graphs. When we speak of large-scale processing flows, especially when it is represented as directed acyclic graphs, we can easily break the process down and explain it step by step.


When we want to prepare certain data computations to run smoothly on the required destination, we implement a type of flow called the data pipeline.


 For example: Take sales transactions. When we want to represent the sales transaction as data for the benefit of consumers, we will make sure the data gets refined by undergoing certain steps. This refinement is a flow and that flow means data pipeline.


The reason why we studied the data pipeline is because, in the directed acyclic graph, this is an important characteristic.


 In Simple terms, a data acyclic graph makes it possible to process flow and flow types and one of the major flow methods that gets used is data pipeline.


Directed acyclic graphs also execute batch processing pipelines and to understand let’s take the example of a global sales database. 


To check how sales were done in all regions of the company, what were the sales rate in the means of US dollars, we inculcated a batch processing pipeline. This pipeline first loads the full sales data, divides it region wise, calculates the money as per each region’s currency and then converts it into US dollars value. Finally the needed report will be shown as a graph.



Features of Directed Acyclic Graph

Directed acyclic graph not only helps in presenting flow data but also helps with various applications. Certain features are:


  • Whatever terms that are used within or outside a block, it gets determined by the directed acyclic graphs.

  • It also finds out if any block’s statements are computed outside the respective block.

  • With the help of directed acyclic graphs, the code can be represented in a way that shows each arithmetic operations’ inputs and outputs. With this, the compiler will be able to eliminate common subexpressions. 

  • There are certain programming languages that will help us to define the value systems which are joined using directed acyclic graphs. When a certain value differs, all the successors are once again computed, Moreover, each value is assessed.



Uses of Directed Acyclic Graph in cryptocurrency


Directed acyclic graphs are most used in the world of cryptocurrency. Some of its important uses are, 


  • Blocks have a time restriction but with the help of directed acyclic graphs such waiting time gets avoided during transactions.

  • Unlike Pow consensus that uses miners, directed acyclic graphs avoid miners to save energy. This helps cryptocurrencies to use energy for transactions without the need of mining.

  • As miners are avoided, micropayments can be instantly done without any need for processing fee. Only a limited fee of node is required which also doesn’t bring any raise in the network congestion.


Final thoughts

Directed acyclic graphs, the advanced type of linked list cycle ii, can be complicated to understand but that’s why they’re used in complex computations. 


There are various problems under this concept such as longest path directed acyclic graphs, that all require complex algorithms. But, without directed acyclic graphs, transaction lists cannot be reported accurately and simply. 

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