4 ms·

I've been randomly skipping around inside these books for a long, long time. They're full of little gems that you won't find elsewhere. For example, in Volume

I've been randomly skipping around inside these books for a long, long time. They're full of little gems that you won't find elsewhere. For example, in Volume 4A there's a simple technique for comparing two pointers in bit-reversed form. This technique was patented by Hewlett-Packard as a method of randomizing search trees (treaps): https://bugfix-66.com/fdb8bb4fa84cf810aa25ff40c88a13c18744109de057431280007fafb484ebab https://bugfix-66.com/fdb8bb4fa84cf810aa25ff40c88a13c1874410... From Volume 3, here is by far the fastest method of sorting integers (Singleton's method), an algorithm I have used professionally several times (e.g., for beam search in a speech decoder): https://bugfix-66.com/834f0677c85b23c0bf1047d3654ab7c27ff05482195908116d49cca52bb593df https://bugfix-66.com/834f0677c85b23c0bf1047d3654ab7c27ff054... Knuth's books are just packed with gems like that. The meticulous high quality of the books is also remarkable. However, if you look very carefully you can find rare mistakes. I received payment from Knuth and have an account at his bank: https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/boss.html https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/boss.html Getting your name on the above list was once a Hacker rite of passage.

Tomte 4y ago
> However, if you look very carefully you can find mistakes. Opened the book, thought "no, it can't be". Agonized for days and weeks if I'm making a fool of myself. Sent the bug report. First word in first sentence in first paragraph in first chapter was wrong. Got my cheque. ;-)
- mkehrt 4y ago
  What was it?!
  - Tomte 4y ago
    "Infinitely many alphabets can be generated by the programs in this book". But the number of parameters is finite, and all parameters have a finite number of possible values. His errata changed the wording thus: Zillions of alphabets can be generated by the programs in this book. (https://ftp.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/ctan/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errata.twelve https://ftp.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/ctan/systems/knuth/dist/err...)
    - dalke 4y ago
      In the late 1990s I implemented an algorithm from one of Knuth's books. (An algorithm to generate prime numbers.) I found a mistake! I was so excited. I then checked the errata. It was known. It took another 20 years before I found an actual mistake, regarding the early history of superimposed codes. A very specialized topic where I have one of the few copies of the patent challenge distinguishing between random superimposed codes and arbitrarily selected superimposed codes. I have a check.
    - desio 4y ago
      Incredible.
quokka 4y ago
I'm somehow on that list twice, which looks like a bug. I wonder if there is a reward for finding an error in the reward list.
- quokka 4y ago
  He fixed the issue quickly after I sent an email.

Tomte 4y ago

> However, if you look very carefully you can find mistakes. Opened the book, thought "no, it can't be". Agonized for days and weeks if I'm making a fool of myself. Sent the bug report. First word in first sentence in first paragraph in first chapter was wrong. Got my cheque. ;-)

mkehrt 4y ago
What was it?!
- Tomte 4y ago
  "Infinitely many alphabets can be generated by the programs in this book". But the number of parameters is finite, and all parameters have a finite number of possible values. His errata changed the wording thus: Zillions of alphabets can be generated by the programs in this book. (https://ftp.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/ctan/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errata.twelve https://ftp.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/ctan/systems/knuth/dist/err...)
  - dalke 4y ago
    In the late 1990s I implemented an algorithm from one of Knuth's books. (An algorithm to generate prime numbers.) I found a mistake! I was so excited. I then checked the errata. It was known. It took another 20 years before I found an actual mistake, regarding the early history of superimposed codes. A very specialized topic where I have one of the few copies of the patent challenge distinguishing between random superimposed codes and arbitrarily selected superimposed codes. I have a check.
  - desio 4y ago
    Incredible.

quokka 4y ago

I'm somehow on that list twice, which looks like a bug. I wonder if there is a reward for finding an error in the reward list.

quokka 4y ago
He fixed the issue quickly after I sent an email.