You don’t need to be a techie to follow this article, I am going to use some basic illustrations as much as I can to bring the point home.
So, what is an Algorithm?
An algorithm can be interpreted as the plan or blueprint for solving a problem. Algorithms are all about finding solutions, and the speedier and easier, the better. The word ‘algorithm’ was formed from algorism “the system of Arabic numerals,” a word that goes back to Middle English. It ultimately stems from the name of a 9th-century Persian and Muslim mathematician Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi. In essence, algorithms are simply a series of instructions that are followed, step by step, to do something useful or solve a problem. You could consider a chapati recipe an algorithm for making chapati, for example.
Algorithm / Recipe for Chapati
The following would be the ingredients that you might need to make chapati dough. This algorithm will help us do soft Ugandan Chapatis
1 kg self-raising flour1 tbsp salt2 tbsp cooking oil1¾ cups cool water
Steps & Instructions on how to make chapati dough assuming you have the above ingredients; Related
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Instructions
Add the flour to a large saucepanNow, Add the salt and cooking oil to the flourWash your hands and dry thoroughlyMix the dry flour to distribute the salt wellStart adding water in the middle of the flour and mix quicklyKeep adding the water slowly as you mix until the dough comes togetherTurn it out onto a clean dry work surfaceKnead into a soft easily breakable dough
Now you know how to make chapati dough! Well, it may not be the perfect one I have come up with. Get to thin of Ingredients as the libraries, tools, or programming language packages you want to use in your algorithm. Then the instructions/steps are the actual steps to creating the program or chapati. Just like you test the dough, in computer science, algorithms are also tested and proven and usually with mathematical basis or language-specific tests. Some steps to consider when you are trying to write an algorithm.
First, determine the goal of the algorithm. The above step should explain what the algorithm will accomplish.Analyze current and historical information pertaining to the problem at hand.Create a rough algorithm that models the steps of the mathematical computation.Begin fine-tuning the algorithm by refining the steps involved.Continue running the algorithm to ensure its correctness.Do some related researchIf possible, prove the algorithm using mathematical proof.
Conclusion
Hope you learned what an algorithm is and have a picture in mind. Using computers to solve problems by employing the appropriate algorithm speeds up the task significantly, which is the reason that the development of new algorithms has progressed so fast since the appearance of powerful computer systems. Now, that simple recipe for chapati can be used by anyone and they would not need to reinvent the wheel
