On 19 Oct 99, at 20:17, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> [ ... snip ...]
> (2) Among the Proths, the fact there are so many possible kinds of
> candidates dilutes the effort, i.e. makes it vastly more time-consuming
> to test all the candidates up below any reasonably-sized threshold.
Ah, but I could write down an immensely long list of Proth numbers,
all of which are _exactly_ 10 million digits long. If I work
systematically through this list, sooner or later I'll strike gold.
Meanwhile, if you're working through the Mersennes (even with a
program four times as efficient), you might be unlucky and not find
one until you're looking at numbers longer than 20 million digits.
That evens the odds out a bit - by then, we'll be eliminating
candidates at the same rate, but mine (being smaller) will be more
likely to be prime than yours.
Having said that, I agree that it's very likely that the biggest
prime number known will be almost always be a Mersenne prime.
Regards
Brian Beesley
_________________________________________________________________
Unsubscribe & list info -- http://www.scruz.net/~luke/signup.htm
Mersenne Prime FAQ -- http://www.tasam.com/~lrwiman/FAQ-mers
