Computational Tractability: The View From Mars

We describe a point of view about the parameterized computational complexity framework in the broad context of one of the central issues of theoretical computer science as a eld: the problem of systematically coping with computational intractability. Those already familiar with the basic ideas of parameterized complexity will nevertheless nd here something new: the emerging systematic connections between xed-parameter tractability techniques and the design of useful heuristic algorithms, and also perhaps the philosophical maturation of the parameterized complexity program.