Subj : LSD radix sort
To   : comp.programming
From : Duck Dodgers
Date : Thu Jul 21 2005 10:27 am

Here is a question that's been bugging me for a long time. Every
description of the LSD radix sort says that it works from the least
significant digit to the most significant, but every implementation
says the opposite by looping from the most significant digit to the
least. Like in Algorithms in C:

for (w = bytesword-1; w >= 0; w--)

This goes from the most significant byte to the least, so wouldn't that
be an MSD radix sort and an LSD radix sort would look like this?

for (w = 0; w < bytesword; w++)

I just don't see how LSD radix sort can be described like it is when
code that implements it seems to be an MSD radix sort. And then the MSD
radix sort--if it's not completely ignored--is really complicated, but
there's no explanation as to why it has to be when the LSD code
practically screams MSD.

Can somebody clear this up for me?

Thanks.

.