We briefly discussed what we mean by algorithms in Chapter 1, but perhaps it bears repeating; algorithms are recipes for solving a specific computational problem. They describe the steps you (or more usually your computer) must take to get from input to output and should guarantee you that if you follow the instructions exactly, you will (1) finish after a finite number of steps and (2) your output will be a solution to the problem they should solve, given the input you had.
If you think I’m being pedantic ...
