On Wed, 17 May 2006, Hans-Christoph Steiner wrote:
I disagree. For me practice is much more important than theory. There are endless theoretical issues with software, yet it generally works. For example, the old theories of software development say that the linux kernel development model does not work. Theories should be based on observation.
Theories that aren't based on observation (and/or logical proofs from axioms) aren't theories by any scientific standard. They're called speculations. Algorithmic theory is not based on speculation. It doesn't even make judgements of value like "O(1) is always better than O(n)". It doesn't say that. It says that when the problem size grows, you always hit a threshold at which point O(1) becomes better than O(n). If you never hit that threshold then you can't accelerate anything by going O(1), and if you never hit the threshold where you need to accelerate something, you can discard the whole question altogether.
I would prefer that the aforementioned "old theories of software development" be not compared with algorithmics because they're at completely different levels of rigor and scientificness.
That said, I don't have a need for 1000's of t_clocks, ... at least not today...
_ _ __ ___ _____ ________ _____________ _____________________ ... | Mathieu Bouchard - tél:+1.514.383.3801 - http://artengine.ca/matju | Freelance Digital Arts Engineer, Montréal QC Canada