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The ACM Journal of Experimental Algorithmics


Volume 5, Article 14, 2000


Analysing Cache Effects in Distribution Sorting

by

Naila Rahman

and

Rajeev Raman

http://www.jea.acm.org/2000/RahmanCache/

Abstract:

We study cache effects in distribution sorting algorithms for sorting keys drawn independently at random from a uniform distribution (uniform keys). We note that the performance of a recently-published distribution sorting algorithm, Flashsort1, which sorts n uniform floating-point keys in O(n) expected time, does not scale well with the input size due to poor cache utilisation. We present an approximate analysis for distribution sorting uniform keys which, as validated by simulation results, predicts the expected cache misses of Flashsort1 quite well. Using this analysis, we design a multiple-pass variant of Flashsort1 which outperforms Flashsort1 and comparison-based algorithms on uniform floating-point keys for moderate to large values of n. Using experimental results, we also show that the integer distribution sorting algorithm MSB radix sort performs well on both uniform integer and uniform floating-point keys.

Received
Accepted
Final Revision
Published




Last updated and validated October 11, 2001, by editor@jea.acm.org

Last updated and validated October 11, 2001, by editor@jea.acm.org