Average case complexity under the universal distribution equals worst-case complexity

Ming Li, Paul M.B. Vitányi
1992 Information Processing Letters  
Li, M. and P.M.B. Vitanyi, Average case complexity under the universal distribution equals worst-case complexity, Information Processing Letters 42 (1992) 145-149. The average complexity of any algorithm whatsoever under the universal distribution is of the same order of magnitude as the worst-case complexity. This holds both for time complexity and for space complexity. To focus our discussion, we use as illustrations the particular case of sorting algorithms, and the general case of the average case complexity of NP-complete problems.
doi:10.1016/0020-0190(92)90138-l fatcat:y3nkfyl2yrahfir2wspetdgbey