I figured that finding the upper bound worst-case makes sense most of the time because that's how we get an idea of the maximum runtime of an algorithm, and we can expect that a given algorithm will never exceed that limit. But, as opposed to that, when do we use lower bound worst-case and lower bound best-case analysis? And why?
I have seen the answers to this question Example of algorithm which has different worst case upper bound, worst case lower bound and best case bounds? but could not understand why would one need to calculate Ω and Θ when the O gives a clear idea of the complexity.
EDIT
My question is not about where we are using the lower bounds, I have seen a couple of examples about that. My question is why and when would one choose lower bound (omega) over upper bound (Big O) to determine the worst case.
Is it because
lower bound immediately gives some bound on the runtime even if we haven’t analyzed the algorithm in-depth?
For example suppose the Upper bound worst case of an algorithm is O(n!), and I have not analyzed the algorithm in-depth but found the lower bound worst-case already Ω(2^n) then instead of going further, I can conclude that the runtime complexity worst case is Ω(2^n), i.e., tits already bad and we need optimization if possible
Odoesn't give a clear idea of the complexity. It'sΘthat gives a clear idea of the complexity, because it's both an upper bound and lower bound. However, there are some algorithms that don't have aΘ. For those algorithms, you need to find a tightΩandOto get the complete picture of the algorithm's performance. However, in most cases, only the worst case performance (given byO) is of interest, so that's whyOis the most commonly cited performance metric. - user3386109Θ(the tight bound) gives a clear idea of the complexity of an algorithm then for the worst-case why don't we considerΘ(g(n))instead ofO(g(n)), for example, the algorithmic time complexity of find max element in an unsorted array isΘ(n)instead ofO(n)- ArkoΘ) is applicable. "However, in most cases, only theworst-caseperformance (given byO) is of interest, so that's whyOis the most commonly cited performance metric." I understand that part as well my question is then whyΩwhenOis the most commonly cited performance metric. - Arko