Linked List Deletion

Deletion by Key

• We traverse through the linked list looking for the key
• We maintain a pointer to the node previous to the match
• If the head is a match we simply reset the head pointer
• If another node is a match, we set its previous node to point to the node after the match node

      public void remove(Type item) {  
           Node previous = null;  
           Node current = head;  
           if (head.data.equals(item)) {  
                head = head.next;  
                return;  
           }  
           while (current != null && !current.data.equals(item)) {  
                previous = current;  
                current = current.next;  
           }  
           if (current == null)  
                return;  
           previous.next = current.next;  
      }  

Deletion by Node

Here we match by node and not by key. 
      public void remove(Node refNode)  
      {  
           Node previous = null;  
           Node current = head;  
           if (head.equals(refNode)) {  
                head = head.next;  
                return;  
           }  
           while (current != null && !current.equals(refNode)) {  
                previous = current;  
                current = current.next;  
           }  
           if (current == null)  
                return;  
           previous.next = current.next;  
      }