Programmers Contest: Fit pictures on a page

[Peter Hansen]

Dan Sommers wrote:
> Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>>This problem is well suited to the abilities of genetic algorithms,
>>and this would probably be an excellent way to learn more about them,
>>even if you don't get the best solution.
> 
> There's some sort of irony or something in there about not writing the
> best genetic algorithm, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

Maybe your irony sensor is getting muddled over the fact that genetic 
algorithms generally *don't* find the best solutions, just relatively 
good ones.  They aren't an exhaustive search, they're basically a random 
search with some features thought to focus the search on more fruitful 
parts of the solution space, thus optimizing it.  Unless *my* irony 
processors are malfunctioning, I don't think there's anything ironic 
about this.  (If anything it looks like the exact opposite of irony, to me.)

-Peter