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by logv 2656 days ago
BOAT is a quick tool I made for analyzing and comparing the Big O growth rate of mathematical functions. I built it to help students get a sense of Big O notation, as its a common class exercise to have to rank several math functions in terms of their Big O. BOAT works by trying to find an upper and lower bound of a given math function by comparing the function against a set of known functions. If it can't find a tight bound, it tries to find an upper bound.

If it's given two functions, it will try to locate their crossover point (if any) using a binary search, as well as compare their growth rates to determine which will eventually grow faster. It might get some wrong (I'm curious which) as it only has a handful of function classes.

The last feature it has is an automated master/muster theorem solver. It's pretty simple - you give it the values of a recurrence relation and it tells you the big O.

Thanks for looking!