[ruby-talk:16097] Re: linked list redux

Johan Dahl <[e-mail]> writes:


[...]

> Why not just use an Array. It has almost all of the functions you would
> expect from a linked list, eg push, pop etc. The only thing missing is
> car and cdr or head and tail but you can extend Array with those

Linked lists usefullness is *fast* adding or removal of single items
inside the list.

We can do that easily with an Array using Array#delete_at but speed is not
constant.

On a bench I just performed, removing 14 elements of a 500-Float-elements
Array with Array#delete_at will take an average of 0.00008 sec, whereas it
grows up to 0.00097 with a 5000-Float-elements Array. That's not what we
want in some situations, where linked lists are useful.

(And I didn't find a way to insert an element in a Array)


Maybe the question is, is Ruby the best language to choose from when
performance deleting/adding elements in a Array is important for you?

Some time ago, I implemented some existing C++ code of mine which performs
learning on neural networks (yes I was working in Japan when I originally
wrote that) in Ruby. Roughly, the Ruby version runs 100 times slower than
the C++ version. (I may not be aware of all tricks I should use to speed
up data processing Ruby code)

We're simply using Ruby for other tasks than heavy data processing. (IMHO)



-- 
Guillaume Cottenceau - http://mandrakesoft.com/~gc/