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Here is a working C# implementation of tarjan's cycle detection.

The algorithm is found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarjan%27s_strongly_connected_components_algorithm

public class TarjanCycleDetect
    {
        private static List<List<Vertex>> StronglyConnectedComponents;
        private static Stack<Vertex> S;
        private static int index;
        private static DepGraph dg;
        public static List<List<Vertex>> DetectCycle(DepGraph g)
        {
            StronglyConnectedComponents = new List<List<Vertex>>();
            index = 0;
            S = new Stack<Vertex>();
            dg = g;
            foreach (Vertex v in g.vertices)
            {
                if (v.index < 0)
                {
                    strongconnect(v);
                }
            }
            return StronglyConnectedComponents;
        }

        private static void strongconnect(Vertex v)
        {
            v.index = index;
            v.lowlink = index;
            index++;
            S.Push(v);

            foreach (Vertex w in v.dependencies)
            {
                if (w.index < 0)
                {
                    strongconnect(w);
                    v.lowlink = Math.Min(v.lowlink, w.lowlink);
                }
                else if (S.Contains(w))
                {
                    v.lowlink = Math.Min(v.lowlink, w.index);
                }
            }

            if (v.lowlink == v.index)
            {
                List<Vertex> scc = new List<Vertex>();
                Vertex w;
                do
                {
                    w = S.Pop();
                    scc.Add(w);
                } while (v != w);
                StronglyConnectedComponents.Add(scc);
            }

        }

Note a DepGraph is just a list of Vertex. and Vertex has a list of other Vertex which represent the edges. Also index and lowlink are initialized to -1

EDIT: This is working...I just misinterpreted the results.

templatetypedef
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user623879
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3 Answers3

9

The above is actually correct, I did not understand what a strongly connected component was. I was expecting the function to return an empty List of strongly connected components, yet it was returning a list of single nodes.

I believe the above is working. Feel free to use if you need it!

user623879
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  • Question: Don't you run into the cycles when constructing the DepGraph that gets passed into the DetectCycle function? Seems like you would, and if you do, then haven't you detected the cycle at that time? – Joe Jan 25 '12 at 14:40
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    Hi, found the above useful and couldn't find any other established solutions, so have just whacked it into github for others to find & contribute to: https://github.com/danielrbradley/CycleDetection Hope that's ok! – Daniel Bradley Jun 18 '12 at 14:29
  • Confirmed working. I did it a little bit differently because I don't want to force side effects on the vertices themselves (essentially making a dictionary of index and lowValues by Vertex), but this worked really well. Thank you! – user420667 Apr 07 '16 at 19:32
5

As of 2008 quickgraph has supported this algorithm. See the StronglyConnectedComponentsAlgorithm class for the implementation, or AlgorithmExtensions.StronglyConnectedComponents method for a usage shortcut.

Example:

// Initialize result dictionary
IDictionary<string, int> comps = new Dictionary<string, int>();

// Run the algorithm
graph.StronglyConnectedComponents(out comps);

// Group and filter the dictionary
var cycles = comps
    .GroupBy(x => x.Value, x => x.Key)
    .Where(x => x.Count() > 1)
    .Select(x => x.ToList())
JohannesH
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5

Example presented above in question isn't functional should anyone want to quickly play with it. Also note that it is stack based, which will detonate your stack if you give anything but the most trivial of graphs. Here is a working example with a unit test that models the graph presented on the Tarjan wikipedia page:

public class Vertex
{
    public int Id { get;set; }
    public int Index { get; set; }
    public int Lowlink { get; set; }

    public HashSet<Vertex> Dependencies { get; set; }

    public Vertex()
    {
        Id = -1;
        Index = -1;
        Lowlink = -1;
        Dependencies = new HashSet<Vertex>();
    }

    public override string ToString()
    {
        return string.Format("Vertex Id {0}", Id);
    }

    public override int GetHashCode()
    {
        return Id;
    }

    public override bool Equals(object obj)
    {
        if (obj == null)
            return false;

        Vertex other = obj as Vertex;

        if (other == null)
            return false;

        return Id == other.Id;
    }
}

public class TarjanCycleDetectStack
{
    protected List<List<Vertex>> _StronglyConnectedComponents;
    protected Stack<Vertex> _Stack;
    protected int _Index;

    public List<List<Vertex>> DetectCycle(List<Vertex> graph_nodes)
    {
        _StronglyConnectedComponents = new List<List<Vertex>>();

        _Index = 0;
        _Stack = new Stack<Vertex>();

        foreach (Vertex v in graph_nodes)
        {
            if (v.Index < 0)
            {
                StronglyConnect(v);
            }
        }

        return _StronglyConnectedComponents;
    }

    private void StronglyConnect(Vertex v)
    {
        v.Index = _Index;
        v.Lowlink = _Index;

        _Index++;
        _Stack.Push(v);

        foreach (Vertex w in v.Dependencies)
        {
            if (w.Index < 0)
            {
                StronglyConnect(w);
                v.Lowlink = Math.Min(v.Lowlink, w.Lowlink);
            }
            else if (_Stack.Contains(w))
            {
                v.Lowlink = Math.Min(v.Lowlink, w.Index);
            }
        }

        if (v.Lowlink == v.Index)
        {
            List<Vertex> cycle = new List<Vertex>();
            Vertex w;

            do
            {
                w = _Stack.Pop();
                cycle.Add(w);
            } while (v != w);

            _StronglyConnectedComponents.Add(cycle);
        }
    }
}

    [TestMethod()]
    public void TarjanStackTest()
    {
        // tests simple model presented on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarjan%27s_strongly_connected_components_algorithm
        var graph_nodes = new List<Vertex>();

        var v1 = new Vertex() { Id = 1 };
        var v2 = new Vertex() { Id = 2 };
        var v3 = new Vertex() { Id = 3 };
        var v4 = new Vertex() { Id = 4 };
        var v5 = new Vertex() { Id = 5 };
        var v6 = new Vertex() { Id = 6 };
        var v7 = new Vertex() { Id = 7 };
        var v8 = new Vertex() { Id = 8 };

        v1.Dependencies.Add(v2);
        v2.Dependencies.Add(v3);
        v3.Dependencies.Add(v1);
        v4.Dependencies.Add(v3);
        v4.Dependencies.Add(v5);
        v5.Dependencies.Add(v4);
        v5.Dependencies.Add(v6);
        v6.Dependencies.Add(v3);
        v6.Dependencies.Add(v7);
        v7.Dependencies.Add(v6);
        v8.Dependencies.Add(v7);
        v8.Dependencies.Add(v5);
        v8.Dependencies.Add(v8);

        graph_nodes.Add(v1);
        graph_nodes.Add(v2);
        graph_nodes.Add(v3);
        graph_nodes.Add(v4);
        graph_nodes.Add(v5);
        graph_nodes.Add(v6);
        graph_nodes.Add(v7);
        graph_nodes.Add(v8);

        var tcd = new TarjanCycleDetectStack();
        var cycle_list = tcd.DetectCycle(graph_nodes);

        Assert.IsTrue(cycle_list.Count == 4);
    }

I added a Id property to the Vertex object so it is simple to see what is being done, it isn't strictly needed. I also cleaned up some of the code a little, author was using naming from page pseudo-code, which is good for comparison, but it wasn't very informative.

Roger Hill
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  • "Above" is meaningless, as answers sort randomly. Better to refer to the specific answer by user's name or link (from "share"). – Mogsdad Apr 08 '16 at 01:13
  • I am adding just two nodes, the first connected to the other, and the result of this is two "loops" containing each node once. Shouldn't this have been zero loops? Edit: nevermind (" Any vertex that is not on a directed cycle forms a strongly connected component all by itself: for example, a vertex whose in-degree or out-degree is 0, or any vertex of an acyclic graph.") – Siderite Zackwehdex Dec 09 '16 at 09:58
  • I forked the project by @danielbradley below and added this version by Roger Hill. Thanks guys. https://github.com/damiensawyer/CycleDetection – Damien Sawyer Nov 18 '18 at 21:41
  • Ha! Scratch that. I just read the code... and it does still use a Stack. Copy / Paste error on my part! – Damien Sawyer Nov 18 '18 at 21:44