frasette

frasette

A Common-Sense Guide to Data Structures and Algorithms, Second Edition: Are Selection Sort steps wrong? (page 71)

Hi @jaywengrow,

I think the table of Selection Sort shows wrong Max number of steps.
For example, for N = 5 we sould have:

  • Comparsions: 10 + Swaps: 2

and not:

  • Comparsions: 10 + Swaps: 4

In the following code, edit size variable to the number of element you want (5,10,20,40,80), run it to print comparsions and steps, and their sum, for a worst case scenario with a descending order array:
fiddle url: JsFiddle

function selectionSort(array) {
  let comparsions = 0;
  let swaps = 0;
  for(let i = 0; i < array.length - 1; i++) {    
    let lowestNumberIndex = i;
    for(let j = i + 1; j < array.length; j++) {
      if(array[j] < array[lowestNumberIndex]) {
        lowestNumberIndex = j;
      }
      comparsions++;
    }
 
    if(lowestNumberIndex != i) {
      swaps++;
      let temp = array[i];
      array[i] = array[lowestNumberIndex];
      array[lowestNumberIndex] = temp;
    }
  }
  let steps = "Comparsions: " + comparsions + " Swaps: " + swaps;
  console.log(steps);
  return array;
}

// code to create a sample of array size = 5,10,20,40,80
let size    = 80;
let counter = size;
let sample  = new Array(size);

for (i = 0; i < size; i++) {
   sample[i] = counter;
   counter--;
}

console.log(selectionSort(sample))

What do you think? Thanks.

Marked As Solved

jaywengrow

jaywengrow

Author of A Common-Sense Guide to Data Structures and Algorithms

Hi,

This is a really good catch! I think that for Selection Sort, the worst case scenario is still 4 swaps, but you’re right that an array in perfect descending order happens not to be the worst case scenario for Selection Sort.

An array like this: [5, 3, 1, 2, 4] - will still give you 4 swaps in Selection Sort.

I’ll have to clarify this in the next version. Thank you!

-Jay

Where Next?

Popular Pragmatic Bookshelf topics Top

jimmykiang
This test is broken right out of the box… — FAIL: TestAgent (7.82s) agent_test.go:77: Error Trace: agent_test.go:77 agent_test.go:...
New
brianokken
Many tasks_proj/tests directories exist in chapters 2, 3, 5 that have tests that use the custom markers smoke and get, which are not decl...
New
ianwillie
Hello Brian, I have some problems with running the code in your book. I like the style of the book very much and I have learnt a lot as...
New
raul
Page 28: It implements io.ReaderAt on the store type. Sorry if it’s a dumb question but was the io.ReaderAt supposed to be io.ReadAt? ...
New
HarryDeveloper
Hi @venkats, It has been mentioned in the description of ‘Supervisory Job’ title that 2 things as mentioned below result in the same eff...
New
AleksandrKudashkin
On the page xv there is an instruction to run bin/setup from the main folder. I downloaded the source code today (12/03/21) and can’t see...
New
curtosis
Running mix deps.get in the sensor_hub directory fails with the following error: ** (Mix) No SSH public keys found in ~/.ssh. An ssh aut...
New
brunogirin
When running tox for the first time, I got the following error: ERROR: InterpreterNotFound: python3.10 I realised that I was running ...
New
adamwoolhether
Is there any place where we can discuss the solutions to some of the exercises? I can figure most of them out, but am having trouble with...
New
tkhobbes
After some hassle, I was able to finally run bin/setup, now I have started the rails server but I get this error message right when I vis...
New

Other popular topics Top

DevotionGeo
I know that these benchmarks might not be the exact picture of real-world scenario, but still I expect a Rust web framework performing a ...
New
DevotionGeo
I know that -t flag is used along with -i flag for getting an interactive shell. But I cannot digest what the man page for docker run com...
New
dimitarvp
Small essay with thoughts on macOS vs. Linux: I know @Exadra37 is just waiting around the corner to scream at me “I TOLD YOU SO!!!” but I...
New
Exadra37
I am asking for any distro that only has the bare-bones to be able to get a shell in the server and then just install the packages as we ...
New
PragmaticBookshelf
Build highly interactive applications without ever leaving Elixir, the way the experts do. Let LiveView take care of performance, scalabi...
New
AstonJ
Biggest jackpot ever apparently! :upside_down_face: I don’t (usually) gamble/play the lottery, but working on a program to predict the...
New
AstonJ
We’ve talked about his book briefly here but it is quickly becoming obsolete - so he’s decided to create a series of 7 podcasts, the firs...
New
Help
I am trying to crate a game for the Nintendo switch, I wanted to use Java as I am comfortable with that programming language. Can you use...
New
DevotionGeo
I have always used antique keyboards like Cherry MX 1800 or Cherry MX 8100 and almost always have modified the switches in some way, like...
New
AstonJ
If you’re getting errors like this: psql: error: connection to server on socket “/tmp/.s.PGSQL.5432” failed: No such file or directory ...
New

Sub Categories: