Moby ints [Re: Num Rat]

[Ray Cromwell]

> 
> At 07:31 PM 7/11/95 -0400, Ray Cromwell wrote:
> > However, it's only worthwhile for large
> > numbers (>512 bits). At n=512, if your bigints are stored as polynomials
> > with a 32-bit radix, then N=512/32=16. 16^1.5 = 64, 16 * lg(16) = 64
> > (so the FFT method and the Karatsuba method are equivalent for numbers
> > of that size)
> 
> I conjecture that the constant factor is rather smaller for the 
> Karatsuba method, so the turnover should be somewhat higher than
> 512 bits.

  True, the Karatsuba method does seem "simplier" than a fast fourier
transform (which a naive implementation would use complex math), however
Karatsuba has some hidden costs which the FFT technique doesn't. Karatsuba
requires dynamically resized integers. (i.e. when you split into subproblems,
you have to rescale to n/2 bit integers) Karatsuba also has to do several
big_int additions per subproblem that the FFT doesn't. If the FFT-Poly
routine is done over a prime field, and it is coded iteratively, it just
might come close to Karatsuba for small n. I am not aware of any 
experimental data, but I am working on the implementation of a high
performance portable big_int library right now, and I'll be doing
some data collecting. 

-Ray