[Shootout-list] small change (that i can do) that would benefit 3 people

[Jon Harrop]

On Saturday 07 May 2005 18:02, Will M. Farr wrote:
> What about tests which run in order n^2 time?  Or order n log(n), or
> tests which don't run long enough to be in the asymptotic range and
> therefore run order a*n + b*log(n) + c*n^2 or something?  Then the
> time/n will not be a good measure of the speed because it will not be a
> constant across different n.  I haven't looked, but surely not all the
> tests run linearly with n.

Asymptotically many of the tests may be O(n) but the time taken will rarely be 
linear in n.

I was thinking along similar lines recently though. Why not have at least some 
tests which try to compute as much as possible in a given time (e.g. 3s)? You 
may lose the ability to do a linear measurement but you still get a ranking 
and you can have more language compete as the very slow ones just don't get a 
lot done in 3s.

-- 
Dr Jon D Harrop, Flying Frog Consultancy Ltd.
Objective CAML for Scientists
http://www.ffconsultancy.com/products/ocaml_for_scientists