Sequential search

In computer science, sequential search is a search algorithm for searching a set of unsorted data for a particular value. A sequential search requires random access to the data being searched. It is the simplest basic search method. In sequential search we start from the beginning of the list, scan down the list, until the desired key is found or we have reached the end of the end of the list.

More presisely, we define sequential search as: A = <a₁, a₂, a₃, a₄ ... a_n> be the list of n records, each record has a key element a_i. Given a key value v, we can find the infomation or retrieve the record for the list, such that v = a_i, i.e. we are finding the target record, by its key value.