User blog:Deedlit11/Bignum Bakeoff appetizer

Vell mentioned the idea of starting a new Bignum Bakeoff. I hope that happens, but here is a closely related problem that could serve as an appetizer to the big contest.

Namely, write a program using the shortest number of characters that implements a function with growth rate comparable to \(f_\varepsilon_0 (n)\). My first interest is using the language C, but you can program in any language you want - each language will be a different category of course.

Some rules:

1. The program must return a number at least \(f_{\omega^\omega^\omega^\omega}(4)\). (Nothing really special about this number, just wanted to pick a number big enough to require an epsilon_0 function but not much bigger.)

2. It is assumed that every language has integer types that can take arbitrary values. Of course, you cannot refer to MAXINT or the like.

More rules will probably be created as issues come up.

Looking forward to seeing some entries!