Software: The Russian algorithm: A second look: What was labeled a breakthrough in linear programming seems now to be largely of theoretical importance

It was too good to be true. News reports last fall indicated that the world of mathematics was being “rocked” by a Russian mathematician's discovery of shortcut solutions to decisionmaking problems common in business and industry — so-called linear programming problems that sometimes require weeks or months of computer time to solve, or could even take thousands of years of computer time.