OpenIDThe Doomsday Algorithm
I always thought you had to be an idiot savant to be able to state the day of the week for any date in history, but it turns out there’s a reasonably simple trick to it. The Doomsday Algorithm was first invented by Dr John Conway, also famous for creating the game of life. Rudy Limeback’s detailed explanation provides everything you need to know about the algorithm, how it works and how to memorise it.
Yup, the Doomsday algorithm is pretty easy to memorize once you use it a few times. I learned it a couple of years ago, and I can still remember how to do it, even though I rarely use it.
The main tricky part that I don't remember is calculating the Doomsday for distant years. But for dates in the current year, or within just few years of the present, I can pretty easily figure out the day of week for arbitrary dates with just a minute of concentration.
Dougal - 4th August 2003 16:15 - #
radiac - 16th September 2003 15:20 - #