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A recursive function named foo, which is passed a single parameter, x, and if the parameter is 0 will call a different function named bar and otherwise will call baz, passing x, and also call itself recursively, passing x-1 as the parameter, could be implemented like this in Python:
This is done by adding another parameter to the basic recursive function and using this parameter as the function for the recursive call. This creates a higher-order function, and passing this higher function itself allows anonymous recursion within the actual recursive function. This can be done purely anonymously by applying a fixed-point ...
C, Java, and Python are notable mainstream languages in which all function calls, including tail calls, may cause stack allocation that would not occur with the use of looping constructs; in these languages, a working iterative program rewritten in recursive form may overflow the call stack, although tail call elimination may be a feature that ...
The function calls itself recursively on a smaller version of the input (n - 1) and multiplies the result of the recursive call by n, until reaching the base case, analogously to the mathematical definition of factorial. Recursion in computer programming is exemplified when a function is defined in terms of simpler, often smaller versions of ...
The special case of tail-recursive calls, when a function calls itself, may be more amenable to call elimination than general tail calls. When the language semantics do not explicitly support general tail calls, a compiler can often still optimize sibling calls, or tail calls to functions which take and return the same types as the caller. [3]
Mutual recursion is also known as indirect recursion, by contrast with direct recursion, where a single function calls itself directly. This is simply a difference of emphasis, not a different notion: "indirect recursion" emphasises an individual function, while "mutual recursion" emphasises the set of functions, and does not single out an ...
Most modern implementations of a function call use a call stack, a special case of the stack data structure, to implement function calls and returns. Each procedure call creates a new entry, called a stack frame , at the top of the stack; when the procedure returns, its stack frame is deleted from the stack, and its space may be used for other ...
Python allows programmers to define their own types using classes, most often used for object-oriented programming. New instances of classes are constructed by calling the class (for example, SpamClass or EggsClass ()), and the classes are instances of the metaclass type (itself an instance of itself), allowing metaprogramming and reflection.