3 ms·

> provided that your problems are not algorithmic complexity What does that even mean?

• gjm11 13y ago
  It means "provided the reason your code is too slow isn't that its performance scales very badly as a function of a parameter that, in practice, is not small". If your code takes time proportional to 2^2^n then for n=4 that's 2^16 x constant, which is probably fine for any reasonable constant, and for n=6 that's 2^64 x constant, which is probably too much for any reasonable constant, so if you're running into problems with n>=6 then moving to a different language or faster hardware or more-micro-optimized code is not going to help you. On the other hand, if your code takes time of order n^2 and typical values of n are in the thousands or millions, then the difference between C and Python, or Core i7 and Z80, or sloppily written code and highly-bummed code with an inner loop in hand-tuned assembler, may make a big difference.
  • azth 13y ago
    Thanks for the explanation. I am aware of that; however, the sentence I quoted does not make sense grammatically; "algorithmic complexity" is not an adjective.
    • gjm11 13y ago
      I did consider adding a final paragraph saying something like "I am assuming here that you were sincerely asking a question rather than merely being rude and snarky, but of course that may not be true", but decided to play it straight. So, having established that you were merely complaining about a grammatical slip, and that despite asking "what does ... even mean?" you knew perfectly well what it meant: Yeah, I agree, it would have been more correct had they written something like "provided that your problems are not a matter of algorithmic complexity" or "provided that your problem is not algorithmic complexity". Congratulations, you found a mistake. (Though not, I think, anything to do with thinking "algorithmic complexity" an adjective.) But (1) so what? and (2) if I'm right in detecting a subtext of "man, if they can make that mistake, why should I take anything else they say seriously?", then I strongly disagree; anyone can perpetrate the occasional grammatical error. (Just out of curiosity, I looked at some of your recent comments, and found one having looked through considerably less text than the length of the article in which you found an error. I dare say one could do the same for mine. To err is human.)
      • azth 13y ago
        Points taken. In my favor; however, English is not my native language :) Though I do definitely make lots of mistakes in my native one.