Merge sort (also commonly spelled mergesort) is an O(n log n) comparison-based sorting algorithm. Most implementations produce a stable sort, which means that the implementation preserves the input order of equal elements in the sorted output. Merge sort is a divide and conquer algorithm that was invented by John von Neumann in 1945. A detailed description and analysis of bottom-up mergesort appeared in a report by Goldstine and Neumann as early as 1948.
Read more about Merge Sort: Algorithm, Natural Merge Sort, Analysis, Use With Tape Drives, Optimizing Merge Sort, Parallel Processing, Comparison With Other Sort Algorithms, Utility in Online Sorting
Famous quotes containing the words merge and/or sort:
“Popular art is normally decried as vulgar by the cultivated people of its time; then it loses favor with its original audience as a new generation grows up; then it begins to merge into the softer lighting of “quaint,” and cultivated people become interested in it, and finally it begins to take on the archaic dignity of the primitive.”
—Northrop Frye (b. 1912)
“It is a curious sensation: the sort of pain that goes mercifully beyond our powers of feeling. When your heart is broken, your boats are burned: nothing matters any more. It is the end of happiness and the beginning of peace.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)