Bug in timsort!?
Roy Smith
roy at panix.com
Wed Feb 25 19:12:51 EST 2015
In article <mailman.19183.1424872728.18130.python-list at python.org>,
Sturla Molden <sturla.molden at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 24/02/15 22:34, Roy Smith wrote:
> > http://envisage-project.eu/proving-android-java-and-python-sorting-algorithm
> > -is-broken-and-how-to-fix-it/
> >
>
> This is awful. It is broken for arrays longer than 2**49 elements. With
> 8 bytes per PyObject* pointer this is >4096 terabytes of RAM. I don't
> see how we can fix this in time.
>
> Oh yes, and they mention that TimSort is used on billions of devices due
> to Android mobile phones. This is clearly very relevant for mobile
> phones. Next thing you know your litte Samsung Galaxy with more than
> 4096 terabytes breaks down from a stack overflow in TimSort.
Keep in mind that the phone I cary around today has more memory (and
probably more CPU) than the biggest supercomputers that existed when I
was in college.
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