Non-Uniform Robust Network Design in Planar Graphs

Robust optimization is concerned with constructing solutions that remain feasible also when a limited number of resources is removed from the solution. Most studies of robust combinatorial optimization to date made the assumption that every resource is equally vulnerable, and that the set of scenarios is implicitly given by a single budget constraint. This paper studies a robustness model of a different kind. We focus on \textbf{bulk-robustness}, a model recently introduced~\cite{bulk} for addressing the need to model non-uniform failure patterns in systems. We significantly extend the techniques used in~\cite{bulk} to design approximation algorithm for bulk-robust network design problems in planar graphs. Our techniques use an augmentation framework, combined with linear programming (LP) rounding that depends on a planar embedding of the input graph. A connection to cut covering problems and the dominating set problem in circle graphs is established. Our methods use few of the specifics of bulk-robust optimization, hence it is conceivable that they can be adapted to solve other robust network design problems.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figure

Robust Assignments via Ear Decompositions and Randomized Rounding

Many real-life planning problems require making a priori decisions before all parameters of the problem have been revealed. An important special case of such problem arises in scheduling problems, where a set of tasks needs to be assigned to the available set of machines or personnel (resources), in a way that all tasks have assigned resources, and no two tasks share the same resource. In its nominal form, the resulting computational problem becomes the \emph{assignment problem} on general bipartite graphs. This paper deals with a robust variant of the assignment problem modeling situations where certain edges in the corresponding graph are \emph{vulnerable} and may become unavailable after a solution has been chosen. The goal is to choose a minimum-cost collection of edges such that if any vulnerable edge becomes unavailable, the remaining part of the solution contains an assignment of all tasks. We present approximation results and hardness proofs for this type of problems, and establish several connections to well-known concepts from matching theory, robust optimization and LP-based techniques.Comment: Full version of ICALP 2016 pape

Approximation Algorithms for Network Design in Non-Uniform Fault Models

Classical network design models, such as the Survivable Network Design problem (SNDP), are (partly) motivated by robustness to faults under the assumption that any subset of edges upto a specific number can fail. We consider non-uniform fault models where the subset of edges that fail can be specified in different ways. Our primary interest is in the flexible graph connectivity model [Adjiashvili, 2013; Adjiashvili et al., 2020; Adjiashvili et al., 2022; Boyd et al., 2023], in which the edge set is partitioned into safe and unsafe edges. Given parameters p,q ? 1, the goal is to find a cheap subgraph that remains p-connected even after the failure of q unsafe edges. We also discuss the bulk-robust model [Adjiashvili et al., 2015; Adjiashvili, 2015] and the relative survivable network design model [Dinitz et al., 2022]. While SNDP admits a 2-approximation [K. Jain, 2001], the approximability of problems in these more complex models is much less understood even in special cases. We make two contributions. Our first set of results are in the flexible graph connectivity model. Motivated by a conjecture that a constant factor approximation is feasible when p and q are fixed, we consider two special cases. For the s-t case we obtain an approximation ratio that depends only on p,q whenever p+q > pq/2 which includes (p,2) and (2,q) for all p,q ? 1. For the global connectivity case we obtain an O(q) approximation for (2,q), and an O(p) approximation for (p,2) and (p,3) for any p ? 1, and for (p,4) when p is even. These are based on an augmentation framework and decomposing the families of cuts that need to be covered into a small number of uncrossable families. Our second result is a poly-logarithmic approximation for a generalization of the bulk-robust model when the "width" of the given instance (the maximum number of edges that can fail in any particular scenario) is fixed. Via this, we derive corresponding approximations for the flexible graph connectivity model and the relative survivable network design model. We utilize a recent framework due to Chen et al. [Chen et al., 2022] that was designed for handling group connectivity

LIPIcs, Volume 261, ICALP 2023, Complete Volume

LIPIcs, Volume 261, ICALP 2023, Complete Volum