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From: liberte@uiucdcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: Re: A Simple Bubble Sort Function - (nf)
Message-ID: <26400014@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 19-Jun-84 01:00:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.26400014
Posted: Tue Jun 19 01:00:00 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 21-Jun-84 01:39:40 EDT
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Nf-ID: #R:umcp-cs:-747100:uiucdcs:26400014:000:1077
Nf-From: uiucdcs!liberte    Jun 18 00:00:00 1984

#R:umcp-cs:-747100:uiucdcs:26400014:000:1077
uiucdcs!liberte    Jun 18 00:00:00 1984

/**** uiucdcs:net.lang / andrew@orca / 10:22 am  Jun 16, 1984 ****/
The continued popularity of the bubble sort is perplexing.

	"In short, the bubble sort seems to have nothing to recommend
	it, except a catchy name and the fact that it leads to some
	interesting theoretical problems."
/* ---------- */

Worth some study:  
	1. the continued popularity of bubble sort and
	2. the perplexity of its popularity - we know so little

Perhaps bubble sort has an intuitive edge.  It is easier to imagine how
it works because it is "flat" and global and items float to their sorted
level.  Unlike the faster, more complex, recursive and hierarchical sorting
schemes, the bubbling of data has great appeal.  Too bad it is slow.

But I wonder if using parallel processing might improve bubble sort's rating.
A parallel version would run in O(n).  Is O(log n) possible?  What is
the fastest known/possible parallel sorting method?


Daniel LaLiberte          (ihnp4!uiucdcs!liberte)
U of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Computer Science
{moderation in all things - including moderation}