Data Structures and Algorithms with Object-Oriented Design Patterns in Python

An Asymptotic Lower Bound-Omega

The big oh notation introduced in the preceding section is an asymptotic upper bound. In this section, we introduce a similar notation for characterizing the asymptotic behavior of a function, but in this case it is a lower bound.

Definition (Omega) Consider a function f(n) which is non-negative for all integers . We say that ``f(n) is omega g(n),'' which we write , if there exists an integer and a constant c>0 such that for all integers , .

The definition of omega is almost identical to that of big oh. The only difference is in the comparison--for big oh it is ; for omega, it is . All of the same conventions and caveats apply to omega as they do to big oh.

A Simple Example
About Polynomials Again