Re:Big-O notation explained by a self-taught programmer
by bogomipz on Saturday October 29, 2016 @03:25PM
(#12825826)
I didn't know the OPs post was tongue and cheek. Sometimes it hard to tell : )
Sure "O" goes back to mathematicians in the late 19th century. What I meant was that Knuth introduced Big O(mnicron) in the context of "Computer Science" literature.
This is the source I am referring to from 1976 SIGACT News:
"I would like to close this letter by discussing a competing way to denote the order of function growth. My library research turned up the surprising fact that this alternative approach actually antedates the O-notation itself. "
On page 22 or page 5 of the PDF:
"The main reason why 0 is so handy is that we can use it right in the middle of formulas (and in the middle of English sentences and in tables which show the running times for a family of related algorithms etc.)."
Sure "O" goes back to mathematicians in the late 19th century. What I meant was that Knuth introduced Big O(mnicron) in the context of "Computer Science" literature.
This is the source I am referring to from 1976 SIGACT News:
http://www.phil.uu.nl/datastructuren/09-10/knuth_big_omicron...
On page 21 or page 4 of the PDF:
"I would like to close this letter by discussing a competing way to denote the order of function growth. My library research turned up the surprising fact that this alternative approach actually antedates the O-notation itself. "
On page 22 or page 5 of the PDF:
"The main reason why 0 is so handy is that we can use it right in the middle of formulas (and in the middle of English sentences and in tables which show the running times for a family of related algorithms etc.)."