NIST

introspective sort

(algorithm)

Definition: A variant of quicksort which switches to heapsort for pathological inputs, that is, when execution time is becoming quadratic.

Also known as introsort.

Author: PEB

More information

David R. Musser, Introspective Sorting and Selection Algorithms, Software-Practice and Experience, 8:983-993, 1997.


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Entry modified 12 October 2010.
HTML page formatted Wed Mar 13 12:42:46 2019.

Cite this as:
Paul E. Black, "introspective sort", in Dictionary of Algorithms and Data Structures [online], Paul E. Black, ed. 12 October 2010. (accessed TODAY) Available from: https://www.nist.gov/dads/HTML/introspectiveSort.html