2 replies to this topic

[TeenChristian]

I was looking at some of the many free MIT online courses, when I found a course dedicated to algorithms. Considering algorithms are a large part of programming I decided to check it out. It looks interesting, so I'm going to test it out a little. Here is a link. What do you think about this online course?

[WingedPanther]

I haven't visited it, but yes, Algorithms is very important.

[Alexander]

That course is heavy on algorithmic complexity (based on the book Introduction to Algorithms, Second Edition: Amazon.ca: Thomas H. Cormen, Charles E. Leiserson, Ronald L. Rivest, Clifford Stein: Books), and goes far beyond the "Big-O" term you may be used to seeing, an example of what you may gain from this is as that the formula f(x) = Θ(g(x)): Θ(n), (which is in Theta notation, meaning the growth rate of f(x) is asymptotically equal to the growth rate of g(x)) can be rewritten equivalently g | f(x) = o(g(x)) in little-O notation (meaning the growth rate of f(x)is asymptotically less than to the growth rate of g(x))

You should start with a more generic book, one I would recommend is "Beginning Algorithms (Wrox)" (Amazon.com: Beginning Algorithms (Wrox Beginning Guides) (9780764596742): Simon Harris, James Ross: Books) which will get you accustomed to the terms and why algorithms are important, getting you into detail of best case, worst case running time and what space your algorithm runs in.