Quote from: kTimesG on Today at 05:52:09 AM

Quote from: newsecurity1986 on April 26, 2025, 11:23:35 PM

What I’m seeing here is you’re tweaking the search method. According to mcd, his method should work better no matter how you run it. If you wanna prove him wrong, you gotta find a way where, even with the same search strategy, the prefix method still messes up.

Otherwise, it’s not a fair fight, ya know?.

The tweaking was bringing it back to its original form: a simple sequential search.

Which results in a very obvious conclusion:

If magic method beats sequential.
But it loses to reverse sequential.
And magic method is tweaked to beat reverse sequential.
But loses to normal sequential.

Then we have a draw.

I'm not the one pushing a better method here.

A better method should work better no matter against what it is being compared.

That is a fair fight. Tweaking prefix endlessly based on how the other method works, and calling it "the same method" is like nuking an enemy when you know his exact GPS location.

Your confusion comes from believing that the prefix method is a search function itself. What I understood is that it's not a search function,it's a feature that, when added to whatever search system you choose, boosts its success rate. It was used in the R+S method and improved it. You tried a reverse search, and it improved that too. Now you're back to sequential search, and I bet it improved again. What I see here is that the prefix method is like a turbo-boost for your chances. And honestly, I doubt someone would’ve donated 0.1 BTC if it was total bullshit.

The only way to prove that prefixes don't work is to find a search method where, if you apply the same logic with prefixes, it actually makes things worse. Otherwise, it's doing something right.