r/algorithms • u/Phytor_c • 4d ago

Discussion This Week I Learned: October 16, 2026

This thread is meant for users to share cool recently discovered facts, observations, proofs, algorithms, or concepts that might not warrant their own posts. Please be encouraging and share as much detail as possible, as we’d like this to be a good place for people to learn!

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u/Phytor_c 4d ago

I learnt Yao's principle (for analysing randomized algorithms), it's quite elementary but a widely used tool. Using it for my current project.

Also, learning about the Yamakawa-Zhandry algorithm.

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u/Interesting_Debate57 3d ago

Yao's lemma is a good jumping off point; randomized algorithms are where it's at (except in logarithmic space, apparently).

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u/cavedave 2d ago

Numbers that can be written in 5 ways as a sum of two (not necessarily
positive) coprime cubes. 2 are known and I found 3 more.

GPU searches were not known when these first 2 were found in 1999 but now its faster to look for these things https://oeis.org/A047697

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u/Phytor_c 2d ago

nice, that's cool