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Mathematical Notation - Big Oh, Omega and Theta

Introduction to Asymptotic Notations - Big Oh, Big Omega and Theta

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21 views14 pages

Mathematical Notation - Big Oh, Omega and Theta

Introduction to Asymptotic Notations - Big Oh, Big Omega and Theta

Uploaded by

saady
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Mathematical Notation - Big Oh,

Omega and Theta


By
Dr. Saad Yunus Sait
Order of Growth of Algorithms

*Chart from Medium.com


Order of Growth Vs Constant Processing Time

Algorithm DoSomething(…)
begin
x = f(input size);
for i := 1 to x do
Do_processing(); /* Each execution takes C time*/
end /* DoSomething */

Time complexity = C.f(n)


Comparison of Performance of n² with 2ⁿ
Consider
f(n) = 10⁶ x n²
g(n) = 2 x 2ⁿ

For n = 10
f(10) = 10⁶ x 0.01 = 10⁴ secs
g(10) = 2 x 0.1024 = 0.205 secs
So, g(n) = 2 x 2ⁿ provides better performance than f(n) = 10⁶ x n² for n = 10

For n = 50
f(50) = 10⁶ x 0.25 = 250,000 secs
g(50) = 2 x 35.702 = 71.4 cen
So, f(n) = 10⁶ x n² beat g(n) = 2 x 2ⁿ
even for a small input of n = 50 despite the large constant of 10⁶ in f(n)

Order of growth overwhelms any differences in constants.


Important Points Regarding Order of Growth
● na grows faster than nb if a > b for a, b ∈ R
○ n5 grows faster than n4, n3, n2 etc.
○ n grows faster than n0.5, n0.33 etc.
○ n-1 is slower than n0 = 1
● lg n grows faster than constant time (n0) but is slower than na for any a>0
○ lg n grows slower than even n0.001
○ (lg n)a also written as lga n grows faster than lg n for a > 1
● If f(n) grows faster than g(n), then for any function h(n), f(n)h(n) grows faster
than g(n)h(n)
○ n2 grows faster than n lg n
○ n lg n grows faster than lg2 n
Asymptotic Notations

● Formal way to describe / compare order of growth

● Indicate which function grows faster / performs better

● Interest is in the performance for large values of n (→∞)

● Constants don’t make a difference


Asymptotic Notations - Big Oh Notation
A function f(n) is said to belong to O(g(n)) if there exist positive constants c, n₀
such that f(n) ≤ c.g(n) for all n ≥ n₀

*Figure from
Medium.com
(Alejandro Ito
Aramendia)
Points to Note Regarding Big-Oh Notation
● Provides an asymptotic upper bound for the order of growth
○ If g(n) has higher or same order of growth as f(n) than f(n) = O(g(n))

● For example
○ nb = O(na) for a ≥ b
○ lg n = O(na) for a > 0
○ lg n = O(lga n) for a ≥ 1
○ n lg n = O(n2)

● Note that n2 = O(n2), lg n = O(lg n) etc.


Big Omega Notation (Ω)
A function f(n) is said to belong to Ω(g(n)) if there exist positive constants c, n₀
such that 0 ≤ c.g(n) ≤ f(n) for all n ≥ n₀

*Figure from
geeksforgeeks.org
Points to Note Regarding Big-Omega Notation

● Provides an asymptotic lower bound for the order of growth


○ If g(n) has lower or same order of growth as f(n) than f(n) = Ω(g(n))

● For example
○ nb = Ω(na) for b ≥ a
○ na = Ω(lg n) for a > 0
○ lga n = Ω(lg n) for a ≥ 1
○ n2 = Ω(n lg n)

● Note that n2 = Ω(n2), lg n = Ω(lg n) etc.


Theta Notation (Θ)
A function f(n) is said to belong to Θ(g(n)) if there exist positive constants c1, c2, n₀
such that 0 ≤ c1.g(n) ≤ f(n) ≤ c2.g(n) for all n ≥ n₀

*Figure from
geeksforgeeks.org
Points to Note Regarding Theta Notation

● Provides an asymptotic tight bound for the order of growth


○ If g(n) has same order of growth as f(n) then f(n) = Θ(g(n))

● For example
○ nb = Θ(na) only for b = a
○ lg n ≠ Θ(na) for any a ∈ R
○ lg n = Θ(lga n) only for a = 1
○ n lg n ≠ Θ(n2)
Example 1
Prove that n2 + 2n + 3 ∈ O(n2)

Proof

n2 + 2n + 3 ≤ n2 + 2n2 + 3n2 = 6n2 for n ≥ 1

So,

n2 + 2n + 3 ≤ 6n2 for n ≥ 1, c = 6 and n0 = 1

⇒ n2 + 2n + 3 ∈ O(n2)
Example 2
Prove that n2 + 4n + 5 ∈ Ω(n2)

Proof

n2 + 4n + 5 ≥ 1.n2 ≥ 0 for n ≥ 1, put c = 1 and n0 = 1

⇒ n2 + 4n + 5 ∈ Ω(n2)

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