Programmers Contest: Fit pictures on a page

[Brian van den Broek]

Peter Hansen said unto the world upon 01/07/2005 11:47:
> Dan Sommers wrote:
> 
>>Peter Hansen <peter at engcorp.com> wrote:
>>
>>>This problem is well suited to the abilities of genetic algorithms,
>>>and this would probably be an excellent way to learn more about them,
>>>even if you don't get the best solution.
>>
>>There's some sort of irony or something in there about not writing the
>>best genetic algorithm, but I can't quite put my finger on it.
> 
> 
> Maybe your irony sensor is getting muddled over the fact that genetic 
> algorithms generally *don't* find the best solutions, just relatively 
> good ones.  They aren't an exhaustive search, they're basically a random 
> search with some features thought to focus the search on more fruitful 
> parts of the solution space, thus optimizing it.  Unless *my* irony 
> processors are malfunctioning, I don't think there's anything ironic 
> about this.  (If anything it looks like the exact opposite of irony, to me.)
> 
> -Peter

Well, I found it ironic, but only when you add that the genetic 
algorithm approach came up in the context of a "best fit" problem. 
Survival of the fittest indeed :-)

Best,

Brian vdB