From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FORGED_HOTMAIL_RCVD2, FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,8cb466bc329b6af9 X-Google-NewGroupId: yes X-Google-Attributes: gida07f3367d7,domainid0,public,usenet X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,CP1252 Received: by 10.68.220.230 with SMTP id pz6mr6311823pbc.3.1341400361592; Wed, 04 Jul 2012 04:12:41 -0700 (PDT) Path: l9ni10839pbj.0!nntp.google.com!news2.google.com!postnews.google.com!glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com!not-for-mail From: Austin Obyrne Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: =?windows-1252?Q?Re=3A_More_on_the_=93Parallel_Sort=94_Data_Sorting_Pro?= =?windows-1252?Q?gram=2E?= Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2012 04:12:41 -0700 (PDT) Organization: http://groups.google.com Message-ID: <3722ca80-0337-41cb-8d21-a11cf4a83d10@googlegroups.com> References: <0117b182-7d8f-40ab-8729-6eb258ba5616@googlegroups.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 86.128.16.224 Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Trace: posting.google.com 1341400361 22550 127.0.0.1 (4 Jul 2012 11:12:41 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 4 Jul 2012 11:12:41 +0000 (UTC) In-Reply-To: Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com Injection-Info: glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com; posting-host=86.128.16.224; posting-account=pmkN8QoAAAAtIhXRUfydb0SCISnwaeyg User-Agent: G2/1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Date: 2012-07-04T04:12:41-07:00 List-Id: On Tuesday, July 3, 2012 3:43:25 PM UTC+1, Brian Drummond wrote: > On Tue, 03 Jul 2012 04:22:43 -0700, Austin Obyrne wrote: >=20 > > I ... would like to point out that =93Counting =93 or =93Count sort=94 > > was invented in 1954. > >=20 > > I quote from Wikipedia, > >=20 > > =93Although radix sorting itself dates back far longer, counting sort, = and > > its application to radix sorting, were both invented by Harold H. Sewar= d > > in 1954.=94 - Unquote > >=20 > > Given the state of progress in computer development at that time this > > invention must surely have been more of a longhand algorithm than a > > computer driven program concept. >=20 > What do you mean by this? Certainly not that he couldn't have implemented= =20 > it and run it on real hardware. Wikipedia places him at MIT where he had= =20 > access to a computer for three years by 1954. >=20 > - Brian Yes, I agree with that. Nothing less than the dynamics of computer computations would have inspired= him to invent his sort method that indexed arrays according to magnitude. =93Although radix sorting itself dates back far longer, counting sort, and = its application to radix sorting, were both invented by Harold H. Seward in= 1954.[1][4][8] =93=20 Looking at this quote again, I hazard a guess that with this man=92s seren= dipity and extraordinary intelligence he saw the enormous potential of comp= uting a la 1954 albeit he was probably working in assembly language. The q= uote herewith suggests that he was interested in sorting data for a long ti= me prior to inventing =93Counting Sort=94. He was a part of the space prog= ram also and did work for them on instrumentation. Further guesses by me i= s that he never implemented =93Counting Sort =93 as a working program in an= y of the low level languages when these came along later. Maybe the archives of MIT may have something (In passing, he died only rec= ently =96 19th June 2012 - RIP.) I claim that there is no evidence of any up and running software in a moder= n language anywhere in the market place in recent times that uses his algor= ithm. I am claiming that my implementation in Ada-95 is the first ever. I will be quite happy to be proved wrong but it is a case of delivery =96 l= et me see it advertised or officially recorded in recent times before I wil= l believe it. Many thanks for your input. Cheers =96 Austin.=20