http://www.wordwizard.com/ch_forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=1...earchTerms=algorithm

routine: a set sequence of steps, part of larger computer program--OneLook

On one of the other word-origin-usage boards I visit, don't remember which one, I was joshed mercilessly about using "algorithm" too often, and therefore I set about looking for a synonym and was surprised to find that there's apparently only one really good one, that is "routine"

I wonder if that's because the former as applied to PC's has only been around a couple of decades

Also I wonder if without making it a major research project you might be able to come up with other synonyms as good as or as close as "routine--thanks all

I'd say that a good definition of routine (synonyms: procedure, function, operation, subroutine) is that it is a named sequence of statements (steps) that can be called one or more times from within a computer program.

An algorithm is a plan for solving a specific problem: how to make change, how to sort some list of numbers, etc. Algorithms are usually expressed in plain old English (or some kind of gussied up artificial language), but computer programs (synonyms: software, applications) are written in programming languages and executed by the computer. Algorithms are read, interpreted, and translated by humans.

As I said on the other word-origin-usage board (which we both know the identity of well), rather than saying:

a. Sorry, I didn't receive it, perhaps it was rejected by my Norton algorithm.

The following makes more sense.

b. Sorry, I didn't receive it. Perhaps it was filtered out by my anti-virus software.

I've never seen you use algorithm in a normal manner. It sounds as nonsensical as "I read War and Peace the other day, but its outline confused me." (Plot? narrative?)

zm: Thank you kindly for all that. But please, where else have I used it incorrectly

Isn't spam rejection properly called a Norton algorithm

Thank you also for the additional synonyms. "subroutine" is a good one which I shall cherish

PS: Thank you too for not naming the other board for if you had done so they certainly would have banned you. On this board it's ok, by the way, to link to that one but not vice versa. They would tear you apart limb by limb

I'm just learning the protocols of all such boards, a very tedious and exacting subroutine

But isn't spam rejection properly cslled a Norton algorithm

Not unless it's two programmers talking about writing the Norton anti-virus software and perhaps sharing strategies for fixing a bug. Norton is a brand name, not a generic one. Spam filtering is what I'd call it. You're the only person I've heard talk/write this way. Here's another way I'd say what you're trying to say:

c. Norton rejected your email (which you wrote to me) because it thought it was spam.

Few people outside of Symantec (the company that owns the Norton brand these days) would know what algorithm Symantec used, though they could possibly reverse-engineer it if they tried hard enough. Most people simply talk about the functionality of a piece of software.

d. I wrote a letter to my mom using OpenOffice.

e. *I wrote a letter to my mom using Microsoft's algorithm.

The first sentence (d) makes sense, the second one (e) does not.

zm: Thank you for that excellent rundown. I will be first to admit my vocabulary is more free-ranging

"d. I wrote a letter to my mom using OpenOffice.

e. I wrote a letter to my mom using Microsoft's algorithm.

The first sentence (d) makes sense, the second one (e) does not"

I agree e isn't very good. I would instead have said "...using Outlook" or at very least "Microsoft's email facility" as I don't know what they call it in the latest version

If worst came to worst and I wasn't sure, I might have written, "Microsoft's email algorithms," which would include whatever they now call Word, and Outlook, as well as other routines used in that general area, and any others they might have added since

Thank you again though I'd still call anti-virus protection a Norton alg... oops, routine. I am open to any more synonyms for the former

A far more comprehensible word is program. As zmj has said, an algorithm is simply one of many parts of a program. It cannot be used on its own. A program will carry out a particular action, not solely one algorithm. Imagine describing bending your arm by describing each muscle by name and when it tightens and loosens. Much simpler to just say "I bent my arm."

"Microsoft's email algorithms"

Ah, but I was talking about snail mail not email.

(1) Use a word processor to write the letter, (2) print it out, and then (3) mail it to my mom. (There, that's an algorithm, but it isn't a program.)

though I'd still call anti-virus protection a Norton alg... oops, routine.

It's not really an algorithm or a routine, it's a program.

Thanks again guys and don't stop

Tho it's becoming clear that "routine" is still the closest

zm: and it fits your example

With 22 years in IT before I saw sense and became an English teacher I feel reasonably well qualified to comment.

Back when I was a programmer someone would give me a task to do - say, write a program to find every piece of e-mail containing any one of this list of banned words. There are lots of different ways to tackle the problem but I'd always start by writing down IN WORDS - a description of what I was going to do.

For this problem it might be

1. Get the date range
2. Look at the first piece of e-mail in the date range
3. If it contains any of the list of banned words print it out
4. If it doesn't ignore it and look at the next one
5. Is it still in the date range? If it is go to step 3
6. If it isn't stop.

Now that's an algorithm, albeit a trivially simple one.

Having done that I'd then turn it into a program by coding in whatever computer language was required.

When I ran it I might say "the program isn't working", if it didn't produce the required results. I might say "the algorithm is faulty" if I thought the logic of my design was wrong.

The person getting the report on the other hand would say "Bob, your banned words detection program isn't working properly." He'd be very unlikely to say "Bob your banned words detection algorithm isn't working."

The bit of software that you are running, be it Word or Outlook or Doom isn't an algorithm. It's a program or a suite of programs. The algorithm is the underlying logic and the same algorithm could produce a million different programmed implementations.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: BobHale,

Bob: Thank you again. While I realize that Word, Outlook, and Norton are programs, none of these is used in its entirety processing email, but only a few subroutines in each one. Where you and I differ, then, whether these routines can be called "algorithms"

So if you are right the term "algorithm", I believe, is undergoing a change in meaning, ie, now considered a part of a computer program that delivers a specific sort of result given certain kinds of inputs

Where you and I differ, then, whether these routines can be called "algorithms"

Could you provide some citations, other than your own, that illustrate this new meaning for algorithm?

quote:

only a few subroutines in each one

If you call a few million "a few". As we have been trying to say, the word you want is program. If for some reason you dislike the word, try software.

Guys thank you, this is all extremely enlightening. Other sources agreee that "algorithm" isn't a set of steps in a computer program but merely the concept that made the routine possible

I do believe that evcentualoly, in a process I call "smearing" for want of a better word, "algorithm" will eventually be accepted bt Merriam to mean not just the concept but also the code behind it

In the meantime, however, it appears that there just simply isn't a word for it, unless you agree with OneLook's def for "routine"

I do believe that evcentualoly, in a process I call "smearing" for want of a better word, "algorithm" will eventually be accepted bt Merriam to mean not just the concept but also the code behind it

I seriously doubt it. I've never seen the word algorithm used as a synonym for the word program. Ever. (I asked for a citation other than yourself ...) Algorithms are written in English or pseudo-code, whereas programs (applications, software) are written in programming languages. You can implement an algorithm in whichever programming language you want to, but the algorithm by itself runs on nothing.

A routine is a part of a prgoram. There is no necessary one-to-one mapping between an algorithm and a routine. There are hardly any one-to-one mappings between algorithms and programs (save for some trivial, quickly written programs called one-offs such as Bob alluded to above).

I've been working in IT for the last twenty years, both as an academic in computer science and a technical writer and a software engineer in the business world. I believe I, and the others involved in this thread, have given you an adequate rundown on the meaning of algorithm and the difference between an algorithm and a program. Whether you choose to ignore or pay attention is up to you.

I'll second what zm said. Before I became a teacher I worked in IT for twenty two years and never once heard anyone use algorithm to mean program. Not once.

quote:

Originally posted by dalehileman:
Where you and I differ, then, whether these routines can be called "algorithms"

Which is very much like saying that where we differ is that you think "a cup of tea" can be called "a kettle" because that's what you use to make it.

Guys, don't get me wrong. As a fellow card-carrying prescriptivist I maintain that broadening or stretching the meaning of a word dilutes the language. For example, "tape" has lately come to mean to record either analog or digital information by any means whatever,...

...eg, including Tivo (which term itself is gaining a broader meaning, but that's the subject for another thread), hard drive, or memory chip. Far superior instead is the coining of an entirely new word that clearly specifies a single function

However, we have to live in the real world, where the average clod (me) drops a word anywhere he feels it will remotely fit, until at length everybody is using that that way, even if the new usage is directly opposite in meaning

If enough of us use it that way long enough the new meaning eventually turns up in Merriam

I call the process "smearing" for want of a better term. There is one though I don't remember it

This is what I feel has happened to "algorithm." If you go to OneLook you will find several defs a liberal interpretation of which seems to indicate that the term can also be used to mean the code constituting part of a computer program and performing a particular job given the appropriate inputs--a routine

Thus if your email got shunted off into my Norton Junk Mail Folder, the expr "Your message got shifted to the nether regions by a Norton algorithm" should be perfectly clear to almost anybody, since it's the principal function of Norton to identify spam

But thank you all for bringing to my attention the original, broader meaning of "algorithm"


Edited to correct spelling in accordance with Jerry's followup

This message has been edited. Last edited by: dalehileman,

Dale,

Why not just give up?

You are welcome to carry on using the word algorithm to mean program in the privacy of your own home, but don't expect anyone else to understand you.

It is highly unlikely that the word will ever come to mean "program" and you are just confusing people by using incorrect terminology.

arnie: I wouldn't be too sure about that. First of all, "algorithm" is often used to mean not program but part of a program, that is, a routine. Go to OneLook and read all the defs under "Computing"

OK, I'll give up instead.

arnie: No, no seriously, don't give up. Go to OneLook under algorithm and see if some of the defs don't imply part of a computer program, such as the subroutine

quote:

Originally posted by dalehileman:
Guys, don't get me wrong. As a fellow card-carrying prescriptivist I maintain that broadening or stretching the meaning of a word dilues the language.

Claiming that a word has a certain meaning is not being prescriptivist. It's just stating a fact.

This thread reminds me of a song by Mason Williams, The Prince's Panties:

There was once a prince who acted strangely in that
He thought life was stupid and it was for him so
He made up a world in which he liked the things we liked
But he had different reasons why he liked them

He liked butter for its color
He would order toast and color
Waitresses, confused would utter
Sir, I've never heard of toast and color

He'd get angry and begin to choke them
The law would come, and they'd arrest and book him
So his life was a mess of trouble
Still he kept it up

He had dogs, a hundred cocker spaniels and he
Called them panties, 'cause they did that mostly, and he
Did not care at all if they would bark and fetch sticks
Run and jump, roll over, and play dead tricks

No, he liked them only for their panting
So he would run them ragged, but one day they got fed up
And chased the prince right up against the fence
And the prince was eaten by his panties

There's glory for you.

quote:

(dalehileman) Guys, don't get me wrong. As a fellow card-carrying prescriptivist I maintain that broadening or stretching the meaning of a word dilues the language.

New word ... to dilue. (v) The effect on the language of broadening and stretching of meanings of words. Source: A fellow carrying a prescriptivist card.

Goofy: "Claiming that a word has a certain meaning is not being prescriptivist. It's just stating a fact."

I disagree. In many cases "meaning" of a word will depend on whose definition you are using. If you accept a grossly smeared (broadened, stretched) def, the prescriptivist may deny its validity and therefore maintain that you aren't stating a fact

jerry: Thank you for pointing out the misspelling. Perhaps you could persuade the Administrators, next time they perform housekeeping, to link up with the Explorer/Outlook algorithm called "Check" which on other boards has proven very handy for a quick spellcheck

quote:

Claiming that a word has a certain meaning is not being prescriptivist. It's just stating a fact.

Ah, but that all depends on what meaning you are claiming "prescriptivist" has.

Please don't hit me, I'm just being facetious.

quote:

Originally posted by dalehileman:
Goofy: "Claiming that a word has a certain meaning is not being prescriptivist. It's just stating a fact."

I disagree. In many cases "meaning" of a word will depend on whose definition you are using. If you accept a grossly smeared (broadened, stretched) def, the prescriptivist may deny its validity and therefore maintain that you aren't stating a fact

If the prescriptivist claims that the word has a certain meaing, irrespective of how the word is used, then I'd say the prescriptivist is ignoring the facts.

Dale, please stop. I'm late to the party, as is my wont, but PLEASE give up this algorthm stuff already.

Treppenwitz, we haven't seen you in awhile. Welcome back!

Dale, You piqued my curiosity, and I checked one of my least favorite word boards and found some of your same posts there as here. I was wondering, just how many word boards do you post on?

k: Three. Used to be five but two banned me for excessive persiflage because I am such a bad person

I am late here as I have been at the World Travel Market all this week.

As a trainer I use algorithms but, as the name can cause confusion, I usually translate it as "flow chart". In training I teach that an algorithm is a useful problem-solving device for those problems that have a number of different steps, but where a yes/no response can be easily arrived at for each step.

Thus step one on an algorithm devoted to deciding whether or not a particular transaction is liable for VAT (UK Value added Tax) might be "Is the company registered for VAT?" If the answer is no, then the algorithm leads directly to the answer, "No VAT chargeable". If the response is yes, then the algorithm might kead to another choice - for eaxmple, "Is the transaction within the UK?". Again the response no would lead to the answer "No VAT chargeable" and the response yes to another choice. And so on until all the possible yes/no responses have been explored.

Because computers are essentially stupid machines that can understand only yes/no situations, algorithms are an excellent way of getting them to make decisions and they are thus a major part of a computer program. However, a program will have other components as well as algorithms and I suggest that it is misleading to call a program an algorithm; why not just call it a program?

Incidentally, I use the US spelling to denote a computer program and the UK spelling to denote any other kind of programme. I have noticed that many others in the UK seem to do the same.

Thanks for explaining an algorithm. As for "program' and "programme" I have taken to always using the simpler spelling of a word. Thus Kimberley is Kimberly. I have trouble spelling and it simplifies my life. By the way, Algorithm is named for the 9th century Arab mathematiciam, al - Khuwarizmi.

Arab mathematiciam

Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī was Persian. Another word that comes from the same source is algorism. This word has a different meaning though.