Given a Directed Graph and two vertices in it, check whether there is a path from the first given vertex to second. For example, in the following graph, there is a path from vertex 1 to 3. As another example, there is no path from 3 to 0.

We can either use Breadth First Search (BFS) or Depth First Search (DFS) to find path between two vertices. Take the first vertex as source in BFS (or DFS), follow the standard BFS (or DFS). If we see the second vertex in our traversal, then return true. Else return false.

Following are C++,Java and Python codes that use BFS for finding reachability of second vertex from first vertex.

C++ Programming

// C++ program to check if there is exist a path between two vertices
// of a graph.
#include<iostream>
#include <list>
using namespace std;

// This class represents a directed graph using adjacency list
// representation
class Graph
{
int V; // No. of vertices
list<int> *adj; // Pointer to an array containing adjacency lists
public:
Graph(int V); // Constructor
void addEdge(int v, int w); // function to add an edge to graph
bool isReachable(int s, int d);
};

Graph::Graph(int V)
{
this->V = V;
adj = new list<int>[V];
}

void Graph::addEdge(int v, int w)
{
adj[v].push_back(w); // Add w to v’s list.
}

// A BFS based function to check whether d is reachable from s.
bool Graph::isReachable(int s, int d)
{
// Base case
if (s == d)
return true;

// Mark all the vertices as not visited
bool *visited = new bool[V];
for (int i = 0; i < V; i++)
visited[i] = false;

// Create a queue for BFS
list<int> queue;

// Mark the current node as visited and enqueue it
visited[s] = true;
queue.push_back(s);

// it will be used to get all adjacent vertices of a vertex
list<int>::iterator i;

while (!queue.empty())
{
// Dequeue a vertex from queue and print it
s = queue.front();
queue.pop_front();

// Get all adjacent vertices of the dequeued vertex s
// If a adjacent has not been visited, then mark it visited
// and enqueue it
for (i = adj[s].begin(); i != adj[s].end(); ++i)
{
// If this adjacent node is the destination node, then
// return true
if (*i == d)
return true;

// Else, continue to do BFS
if (!visited[*i])
{
visited[*i] = true;
queue.push_back(*i);
}
}
}

// If BFS is complete without visiting d
return false;
}

// Driver program to test methods of graph class
int main()
{
// Create a graph given in the above diagram
Graph g(4);
g.addEdge(0, 1);
g.addEdge(0, 2);
g.addEdge(1, 2);
g.addEdge(2, 0);
g.addEdge(2, 3);
g.addEdge(3, 3);

int u = 1, v = 3;
if(g.isReachable(u, v))
cout<< "\n There is a path from " << u << " to " << v;
else
cout<< "\n There is no path from " << u << " to " << v;

u = 3, v = 1;
if(g.isReachable(u, v))
cout<< "\n There is a path from " << u << " to " << v;
else
cout<< "\n There is no path from " << u << " to " << v;

return 0;
}

Output:

 There is a path from 1 to 3
 There is no path from 3 to 1
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