Interaction Testing, Fault Location, and Anonymous Attribute-Based Authorization

abstract: This dissertation studies three classes of combinatorial arrays with practical applications in testing, measurement, and security. Covering arrays are widely studied in software and hardware testing to indicate the presence of faulty interactions. Locating arrays extend covering arrays to achieve identification of the interactions causing a fault by requiring additional conditions on how interactions are covered in rows. This dissertation introduces a new class, the anonymizing arrays, to guarantee a degree of anonymity by bounding the probability a particular row is identified by the interaction presented. Similarities among these arrays lead to common algorithmic techniques for their construction which this dissertation explores. Differences arising from their application domains lead to the unique features of each class, requiring tailoring the techniques to the specifics of each problem. One contribution of this work is a conditional expectation algorithm to build covering arrays via an intermediate combinatorial object. Conditional expectation efficiently finds intermediate-sized arrays that are particularly useful as ingredients for additional recursive algorithms. A cut-and-paste method creates large arrays from small ingredients. Performing transformations on the copies makes further improvements by reducing redundancy in the composed arrays and leads to fewer rows. This work contains the first algorithm for constructing locating arrays for general values of $d$ and $t$. A randomized computational search algorithmic framework verifies if a candidate array is $(\bar{d},t)$-locating by partitioning the search space and performs random resampling if a candidate fails. Algorithmic parameters determine which columns to resample and when to add additional rows to the candidate array. Additionally, analysis is conducted on the performance of the algorithmic parameters to provide guidance on how to tune parameters to prioritize speed, accuracy, or a combination of both. This work proposes anonymizing arrays as a class related to covering arrays with a higher coverage requirement and constraints. The algorithms for covering and locating arrays are tailored to anonymizing array construction. An additional property, homogeneity, is introduced to meet the needs of attribute-based authorization. Two metrics, local and global homogeneity, are designed to compare anonymizing arrays with the same parameters. Finally, a post-optimization approach reduces the homogeneity of an anonymizing array.Dissertation/ThesisDoctoral Dissertation Computer Science 201

Permutation Decoding and the Stopping Redundancy Hierarchy of Cyclic and Extended Cyclic Codes

We introduce the notion of the stopping redundancy hierarchy of a linear block code as a measure of the trade-off between performance and complexity of iterative decoding for the binary erasure channel. We derive lower and upper bounds for the stopping redundancy hierarchy via Lovasz's Local Lemma and Bonferroni-type inequalities, and specialize them for codes with cyclic parity-check matrices. Based on the observed properties of parity-check matrices with good stopping redundancy characteristics, we develop a novel decoding technique, termed automorphism group decoding, that combines iterative message passing and permutation decoding. We also present bounds on the smallest number of permutations of an automorphism group decoder needed to correct any set of erasures up to a prescribed size. Simulation results demonstrate that for a large number of algebraic codes, the performance of the new decoding method is close to that of maximum likelihood decoding.Comment: 40 pages, 6 figures, 10 tables, submitted to IEEE Transactions on Information Theor

Commutative association schemes

Association schemes were originally introduced by Bose and his co-workers in the design of statistical experiments. Since that point of inception, the concept has proved useful in the study of group actions, in algebraic graph theory, in algebraic coding theory, and in areas as far afield as knot theory and numerical integration. This branch of the theory, viewed in this collection of surveys as the "commutative case," has seen significant activity in the last few decades. The goal of the present survey is to discuss the most important new developments in several directions, including Gelfand pairs, cometric association schemes, Delsarte Theory, spin models and the semidefinite programming technique. The narrative follows a thread through this list of topics, this being the contrast between combinatorial symmetry and group-theoretic symmetry, culminating in Schrijver's SDP bound for binary codes (based on group actions) and its connection to the Terwilliger algebra (based on combinatorial symmetry). We propose this new role of the Terwilliger algebra in Delsarte Theory as a central topic for future work.Comment: 36 page

Construction of nested space-filling designs

New types of designs called nested space-filling designs have been proposed for conducting multiple computer experiments with different levels of accuracy. In this article, we develop several approaches to constructing such designs. The development of these methods also leads to the introduction of several new discrete mathematics concepts, including nested orthogonal arrays and nested difference matrices.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/09-AOS690 the Annals of Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aos/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

A polynomial construction of perfect sequence covering arrays

A PSCA$(v, t, \lambda)$ is a multiset of permutations of the $v$-element alphabet $\{0, \dots, v-1\}$ such that every sequence of $t$ distinct elements of the alphabet appears in the specified order in exactly $\lambda$ permutations. For $v \geq t$, let $g(v, t)$ be the smallest positive integer $\lambda$ such that a PSCA$(v, t, \lambda)$ exists. We present an explicit construction that proves $g(v,t) = O(v^{t(t-2)})$ for fixed $t \geq 4$. The method of construction involves taking a permutation representation of the group of projectivities of a suitable projective space of dimension $t - 2$ and deleting all but a certain number of symbols from each permutation. In the case that this space is a Desarguesian projective plane, we also show that there exists a permutation representation of the group of projectivities of the plane that covers the vast majority of 4-sequences of its points a fixed number of times

The Perfect Binary One-Error-Correcting Codes of Length 15: Part II--Properties

A complete classification of the perfect binary one-error-correcting codes of length 15 as well as their extensions of length 16 was recently carried out in [P. R. J. \"Osterg{\aa}rd and O. Pottonen, "The perfect binary one-error-correcting codes of length 15: Part I--Classification," IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory vol. 55, pp. 4657--4660, 2009]. In the current accompanying work, the classified codes are studied in great detail, and their main properties are tabulated. The results include the fact that 33 of the 80 Steiner triple systems of order 15 occur in such codes. Further understanding is gained on full-rank codes via switching, as it turns out that all but two full-rank codes can be obtained through a series of such transformations from the Hamming code. Other topics studied include (non)systematic codes, embedded one-error-correcting codes, and defining sets of codes. A classification of certain mixed perfect codes is also obtained.Comment: v2: fixed two errors (extension of nonsystematic codes, table of coordinates fixed by symmetries of codes), added and extended many other result