Time bounds for selection

  • Authors:
  • Manuel Blum;Robert W. Floyd;Vaughan Pratt;Ronald L. Rivest;Robert E. Tarjan

  • Affiliations:
  • -;-;-;-;-

  • Venue:
  • Journal of Computer and System Sciences
  • Year:
  • 1973

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Abstract

The number of comparisons required to select the i-th smallest of n numbers is shown to be at most a linear function of n by analysis of a new selection algorithm-PICK. Specifically, no more than 5.4305 n comparisons are ever required. This bound is improved for extreme values of i, and a new lower bound on the requisite number of comparisons is also proved.