A remark to this thread:

Dean_Swan at Mitel.COM wrote:
>
>      As I said, I'll have to play around with what you've done.  Speed is
> extremely important for genetic algorithms, since for non-trivial applications,
> you may have to run it for thousands or even millions of generations (assuming
> you start from a completely random population) to get a usable answer.

It's true that speed is important for evolutionary algorithms.

I have used them for optimization of image processing operations. In
this area the to be optimized evaluation function tooks almost whole of
the computation time, time consumed in EA algorithms outside the
evaluation function was negligible.

So for *me* flexibility and readability have priority over the last bit
of speed regarding EA implementations (outside the evaluation function).

Greetings,

Stephan

-- 
Stephan Rudlof (sr at evolgo.de)
   "Genius doesn't work on an assembly line basis.
    You can't simply say, 'Today I will be brilliant.'"
    -- Kirk, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4731.3