The original post is probably prime. A prime factor can be up to the square root of a number. For this 1800 digit number, the square root is 900 digits. How can anyone know for sure that the number Elon posted is in fact prime?
For this post "potentially prime" means contains no prime factors smaller than 1 million. That is the limit of my patience. (About 6 minutes with my quickly cobbled together C++ program, compiled with -O3.)
If the 7 is shifted one character to the right, the prime factors are 29, 83, ...
If the 7 is shifted one character to the left, the prime factors are 1399, ...
If the 7 is shifted one character up, the prime factors are 231529, ...
If the 7 is shifted one character down, the prime factors are 12277, 47981 ...
If the 7 is changed to 1, the prime factors are 7, 11, 13, 2591, 24373 ...
If the 7 is changed to 2 it is potentially prime.
If the 7 is changed to 3, the prime factors are 3, 19, ...
If the 7 is changed to 4, the prime factors are 653, ...
If the 7 is changed to 5 it is potentially prime.
If the 7 is changed to 6, the prime factors are 3, ...
If the 7 is changed to 8, the prime factors are 7, 21701 ...
If the 7 is changed to 9, the prime factors are 3, 439 ...
TL;DR It's likely that the 7 needs to be where it is and it needs to be a 7.
The Java BigInteger class has a method .isProbablePrime(int certainty) which claims to return true if a given number is likely prime up to the requested level of certainty.
I tested Elon's prime up to a certainty of 10,240, and it returned true.
This means that there is less than one chance in 10^3000 that the number is composite.
From the JavaDoc:
Returns true if this BigInteger is probably prime, false if it's definitely composite. If certainty is ≤ 0, true is returned.
Params:
certainty – a measure of the uncertainty that the caller is willing to tolerate: if the call returns true the probability that this BigInteger is prime exceeds (1 - (1/2) ^ certainty). The execution time of this method is proportional to the value of this parameter.
Returns: true if this BigInteger is probably prime, false if it's definitely composite.
Here's the Java code (String taken from above C++ code. Thanks!)
package misc.primes;
import java.math.*;
public class XPrime { static final String xPrimeString = "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 01 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 02 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 03 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 04 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 05 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 06 "111111111111188888888888111111111111111111888811111111111111" + //line 07 "111111111111118888888888881111111111111188888111111111111111" + //line 08 "111111111111111888811118888111111111118888811111111111111111" + //line 09 "111111111111111118888111888811111111188881111111111111117111" + //line 10 // originally ends 7111 "111111111111111111888811188888111118888811111111111111111111" + //line 11 "111111111111111111188888111888811888881111111111111111111111" + //line 12 "111111111111111111111888811188888888111111111111111111111111" + //line 13 "111111111111111111111188881118888811111111111111111111111111" + //line 14 "111111111111111111111118888811188881111111111111111111111111" + //line 15 "111111111111111111111111188881118888811111111111111111111111" + //line 16 "111111111111111111111111188888811188881111111111111111111111" + //line 17 "111111111111111111111118888888881118888111111111111111111111" + //line 18 "111111111111111111111888881118888111888881111111111111111111" + //line 19 "111111111111111111118888111111888881118888111111111111111111" + //line 20 "111111111111111111888881111111118888111888811111111111111111" + //line 21 "111111111111111188888111111111111888811118888111111111111111" + //line 22 "111111111111118888811111111111111188888888888811111111111111" + //line 23 "111111111111188881111111111111111111888888888881111111111111" + //line 24 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 25 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 26 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 27 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 28 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111" + //line 29 "111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111";
}