Help..Write a Matlab function that would arrange a series of numbers without using sort

Write a Matlab function that would arrange a series of numbers (i.e. a row vector) in a descending order. As an example, use the vector 2 15 50 3 8 11 5 29

how would i do this without using the sort cmd?

thanks in advance.

[Jan]

It is a good and established method for homework questions to show, what you have done so far and explain, which problems occurred. You cannot and should not expect the forum to solve your homework.

Answer 1

[Walter Roberson]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorting_algorithm

[Cedric]

Illustrated below if you have a lot of time.. ;)

• Bubble-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyZQPjUT5B4
• Insert-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROalU379l3U
• Merge-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaqR3G_NVoo
• Quick-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDgvnbUIqT4
• Select-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ns4TPTC8whw
• Shell-sort : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmPA7zE8mx0

Answer 2

[Jan]

A bold version - hesitate to submit it except you can explain the "infinite monkey theorem" fluently:

x = [2, 15, 50, 3, 8, 11, 5, 29];
n = length(x);
while ~issorted(x)
  x = x(randperm(n));
end

Beside the fact, that this requires a ZillionHz CPU to get finished in a bearable amount of time for larger input, it is short and clear. Unfortunately there is no guarantee, that this algorithm stops, such that it does not satisfy a strict definition of a program. But the question text did not demand a "program", but a "function". If you are able to explain the the difference from the viewpoint of coding theory, I'd accept this as a valid solution.