Selection sort algorithm

Another popular sorting algorithm is selection sort. The selection sort algorithm begins by finding the smallest element in the list and interchanges it with the data stored at the first position in the list. Thus, it sorts the sublist sorted up to the first element. This process is repeated for (n-1) times to sort n items.

Next, the second smallest element, which is the smallest element in the remaining list, is identified and interchanged with the second position in the list. This makes the initial two elements sorted. The process is repeated, and the smallest element remaining in the list is swapped with the element in the third index on the list. This means that the first three elements are now sorted.

Let’s look at an example to understand how the algorithm works. We’ll sort the following list of four elements {15, 12, 65, 10, 7}, as shown in Figure 11.14, along with their index positions using the selection sort algorithm: