Word: algorithm
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Unlike the basic unit of conventional computer programming -- the algorithm, which details a precise series of steps that will yield a precise result -- those rules (referred to in computerese as heuristics) state a relationship that is likely, but not guaranteed, to yield an outcome. Heuristics allow computers to deal with situations that cannot be reduced to mathematical formulas and may involve many exceptions. It is the kind of reasoning that governs countless everyday decisions, ranging from the mundane, such as choosing the appropriate clothes for a job interview, to the apocalyptic, such as deciding whether a Soviet missile launch...
Lozano-Perez has come up with an algorithm which allows a robot arm to carry out a pre-programmed series of tasks while avoiding obstacles which are placed in its way. He now is trying to come up with methods by which robots can "fiddle" with machine parts in order to make them...
...most powerful computers have had great difficulty juggling the bits and pieces of data. Now Narendra Karmarkar, a 28-year-old Indian-born mathematician at Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, N.J., after only a year's work has cracked the puzzle of linear programming by devising a new algorithm, a step-by-step mathematical formula. He has translated the procedure into a program that should allow computers to track a greater combination of tasks than ever before and in a fraction of the time...
When the computer program be comes available to commercial users, American Airlines will be far from the only customer waiting in line. Bell Labs' parent company, AT&T, will probably employ the algorithm to route millions of telephone calls through hundreds of thousands of cities and towns more efficiently and profitably. Exxon has expressed interest in Karmarkar's program to help improve its allocation of supplies of crude oil among various refineries. For many large companies, says Graham, finding the best solution, as opposed to one that is merely workable, "can mean the difference between a good balance...
...nine digit number--the last in a century-old list of seemingly unfactorable numbers composed by a famous French mathematician--was broken down by a Cray supercomputer. The implications of this are revolutionary. While the breakdown of the number, more simply known as 2251-1, utilized only a sleek algorithm and no revolutionary advances, it signaled the ever-growing importance of ultra-sophisticated computers...