Is this the simplest (and most surprising) sorting algorithm?
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2007–2026One slot for every year since HN launched. Height is that year's peak points; orange marks a 100+ point or 50+ comment breakout. Select a bar to open its strongest thread.
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HN comment orderHigh level description of why it sorts: The inner loop takes an array and an index i in the array, and rearranges the array to put the largest value at index i. This is done in such a way that if the sub-array up to but not including i is sorted, then afterwords the sort will be extended such that the sub-array up to and including i will be sorted. The outer loop says, just call in to the inner…
Lots of people in this thread saying that it's just an unoptimised Bubble Sort. No, it really isn't. In bubble sort you see if two things are the wrong way round and it they are then you swap them. This does that (sort of) the "wrong way round". In Bubble Sort your indices are always i<j ... here they aren't. In Bubble Sort you only ever compare adjacent items. Here you don't. This really, really isn't Bubble Sort, unoptimised or…
The first top-level comment from each of the four biggest threads, in HN’s own order. Excerpts are shortened; open a comment for full context.
- Breakout years
- 2
- Total points
- 749
- Total comments
- 431
100+ points or 50+ comments
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
reference only — not used in Hall rules or ranking
Every submission
| Date | Title as submitted | By | Points | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2021-10-05 | Is this the simplest (and most surprising) sorting algorithm?First breakout · Best thread | ColinWright | 615 | 313 |
| 2023-03-01 | The “I can't believe it can sort” algorithm | BiteCode_dev | 2 | 0 |
| 2025-01-17 | Is this the simplest (and most surprising) sorting algorithm? | fanf2 | 2 | 0 |
| 2025-02-24 | Is this the simplest (and most surprising) sorting algorithm ever? (2021)Latest 20+ point return | gnabgib | 130 | 118 |