Find Maximum in a List of Random Numbers

This program has a divide and conquer algorithm to find the maximum element of a list. It works as follows:

      function findmax(list)
        { var k; var r; var left; var right;
          k = Math.floor(list.length/2);
          if (k > 0)
            { left = list.slice(0,k);
              right = list.slice(k,list.length);
              r = Math.max(findmax(left),findmax(right)); }
          else
            { r=list[0]; }
          return(r); }

If the list is longer than one element, then the function splits the list into two halves called "left" and "right" and calls itself as "findmax(left)" and "findmax(right)" as these parameters. Their maximum gives then the return value "r" of the function. If the list contains just one element then the return value "r" is exactly this element.

This implementation outputs the list currently processed by the function findmax before this function returns a value. The additional features for this diagnostic output is not listed in the program for "findmax" above. Also the parameter "level" which gives the level of recursion of a call to "findmax" is only in the actual implementation. The recursive subcalls of the function "findmax" are listed before the call itself.

Java Script starts here.

Java Script ends here.