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=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 109fba,baaf5f793d03d420 X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: fc89c,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gidfc89c,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,6154de2e240de72a X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public From: dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar) Subject: Re: Teaching sorts [was Re: What's the best language to start with?] Date: 1996/08/09 Message-ID: #1/1 X-Deja-AN: 173138114 references: <31FBC584.4188@ivic.qc.ca> <01bb83f5$923391e0$87ee6fce@timpent.airshields.com> <4uah1k$b2o@solutions.solon.com> <01bb853b$ca4c8e00$87ee6fce@timpent.airshields.com> <4udb2o$7io@solutions.solon.com> organization: Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.unix.programmer,comp.lang.ada Date: 1996-08-09T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Robert Eachus says " I managed to do the "fun" experiment once. Take three students and have them learn Quicksort, Heapsort, and Bubblesort on "small" decks. At even 50 to 60 cards, the students doing Heapsort and Quicksort are racing each other*, and the Bubblesort victim is still hard at work well after they have finished." Try extending your experiment (I have also used this) a bit. Have a fourth person sort the deck who knows none of these algorithms. That fourth person will typically beat the Quicksort and Heapsort guys. Why? Because the natural way to sort cards is with some physical embodiment of adress calculation sorting, which can have an average time performance that is order (N) rather than order N log N. This can be an instructive addition to your experiment!