BrowserUk,
Thanks. I didn't spend any time trying to tweak it to squeeze every last bit of power out of it so I am pleased that it performed well. I do have a confession to make. The reason I asked the question in the first place is so that I could get a free education. Let me explain:

While I have illusions of grandeur, I realize that many people that frequent this site are both far more knowledgeable and intelligent than I am. I haven't had any formal training on algorithms and I can't seem to force myself to do any reading on my own. I have assimilated lots of little pieces of information which allow me to write fairly efficient code naturally but I couldn't figure out the big O if you held a gun to my head. Additionally, I don't have the ability to see how changing factors, such as the length of each list, effects a given algorithm without just testing it.

The problem with just using the TIAS approach is that you can get misleading results depending on your sample size. This isn't to say that I don't believe benchmarking isn't valuable. I do benchmark, but I seem to retain more from seeing how others solve the same problem. It is as though until they expand the boundaries of the box I am thinking in, there is only so far I can stretch my imagination.

So again - thanks - to you, and everyone else here at the Monastery that has given me a high-priced education over the last 2 1/2 years for free.

Cheers - L~R

In reply to Re^2: Better mousetrap (getting top N values from list X) by Limbic~Region
in thread Better mousetrap (getting top N values from list X) by Limbic~Region

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