Exploring Stack Operations in Kotlin

Welcome back! As we continue to explore stack operations in Kotlin, remember how these structures serve similar functions in programming as they do in simple physical tasks. For instance, when you stack plates, the last one you put on top is the first one you'll take off when setting the table. A computer's stack allows us to temporarily put away pieces of data, just as we can pile those plates and retrieve them later in the reverse order of how they were placed. Today, we will apply the last-in, first-out principle to solve two specific problems that will solidify your understanding of stack operations in Kotlin.

Validating nested structures such as parentheses is common in computing — it's like ensuring that a series of opened boxes are correctly closed. We will create a function to verify that a string of parentheses is properly nested and closed — essentially checking for balance.

Unbalanced parenthesis can result in errors while coding in most programming languages. A potential use case of this function is making sure a conditional if-statement contains open and closing braces {} containing the statement to be executed.

If we consider a simple way to approach this problem, we could initialize a counter variable for each type of bracket (parentheses, braces, and square brackets), increment the counters when we encounter an opening bracket, and decrement it when we get a closing bracket. Although this approach checks whether we have a closing bracket for every opening bracket, it completely misses one critical aspect — the order of brackets. For the brackets to be considered balanced, every closing bracket must correspond to the most recently opened bracket of the same type, which is not checked in this approach.

A stack data structure is an efficient way to solve this problem. The stack follows the LIFO (Last In, First Out) principle, which makes it highly suitable to track the order of opening and closing brackets, as the most recently opened bracket needs to be closed before we move on to the next opening bracket.