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I have a scenario for you, /sci/
The challenge is to get to a predetermined wikipedia page, by pressing only the random article button. In this scenario, you won't get repeat articles until you get through every single one on the site. With every article you reach, a program will check if it's the one you're looking for.
Now, you have two choices -
>Brute force single clicks, you get a check every page
>Double clicks, meaning you go through two pages at a time. HOWEVER, only every other one counts for a check, meaning you can skip over the page you're looking for and will have to go all the way back through every wikipedia article before you get another chance to see it
Which option do you go with?
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>>9161602
bump
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>>9161602
It seems like it wouldn't make a difference, it's just the same as having the articles in a different order, but it's random anyway
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>>9161833
But with the second option, you'd need to account for the possibility of skipping the target, because it would drastically increase the time it takes to get there.
There are roughly 5.5 million pages on wikipedia, so getting through 2 at once isn't insignificant.
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>>9161602
Let's assume 5 million articles
Option 1 means you scan through 5 million pages
Option 2 means you scan through 2.5 million pages,and you have a 50% chance of missing but when you miss,you will have to scan through every article again,making it 7.5 million
I'd rather go with option one,thanks
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>>9161878
The goal here is to calculate probability, though. And the probability of hitting the target increases with each article that gets counted. Remember that you're still doing two articles as well, so even if you miss the first time that's still only about 6 million total you have to go through.
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>>9161881
I see,let's keep the thread going
From what I know,probability should be 1/6,000,000+1/12,000,000.... etc
I'm not a mathematician,so if anyone would do the maths that would be great
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>>9161875
"skipping" the target doesn't mean anything. Wikipedia's random button doesn't keep you from going to a page if you've randomed it before every other page. There's no difference between double and single clicks.
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>>9161983
Read the OP, for the sake of the scenario you only get one instance of each page per 5 million
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I guess you'd want to go with single clicks since you have a 100% chance of getting it in the first 5000000, whereas with double clicks you only have a 50% chance to get it every 2.5 million. So in the second case you'd expect to get it in the same number of clicks as the first case, but could potentially never get it.
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>>9161602
What's the advantage of 2 supposed to be?
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>>9162222
You increase your probability twice as fast per click
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