Interview Question: Merge two sorted singly linked lists without creating new nodes

Question

This is a programming question asked during a written test for an interview. \"You have two singly linked lists that are already sorted, you have to merge them and return a

Answer 1

        /* Simple/Elegant Iterative approach in Java*/    
        private static LinkedList mergeLists(LinkedList list1, LinkedList list2) {
                    Node head1 = list1.start;
                    Node head2 = list2.start;
                    if (list1.size == 0)
                    return list2;
                    if (list2.size == 0)
                    return list1;               
                    LinkedList mergeList = new LinkedList();
                    while (head1 != null && head2 != null) {
                        if (head1.getData() < head2.getData()) {
                            int data = head1.getData();
                            mergeList.insert(data);
                            head1 = head1.getNext();
                        } else {
                            int data = head2.getData();
                            mergeList.insert(data);
                            head2 = head2.getNext();
                        }
                    }
                    while (head1 != null) {
                        int data = head1.getData();
                        mergeList.insert(data);
                        head1 = head1.getNext();
                    }
                    while (head2 != null) {
                        int data = head2.getData();
                        mergeList.insert(data);
                        head2 = head2.getNext();
                    }
                    return mergeList;
                }

/* Build-In singly LinkedList class in Java*/
class LinkedList {
    Node start;
    int size = 0;

    void insert(int data) {
        if (start == null)
            start = new Node(data);
        else {
            Node temp = start;
            while (temp.getNext() != null) {
                temp = temp.getNext();
            }
            temp.setNext(new Node(data));
        }
        size++;
    }

    @Override
    public String toString() {

        String str = "";
        Node temp=start;
        while (temp != null) {
            str += temp.getData() + "-->";
            temp = temp.getNext();
        }
        return str;
    }

}