Model Checking Parse Trees

Parse trees are fundamental syntactic structures in both computational linguistics and compilers construction. We argue in this paper that, in both fields, there are good incentives for model-checking sets of parse trees for some word according to a context-free grammar. We put forward the adequacy of propositional dynamic logic (PDL) on trees in these applications, and study as a sanity check the complexity of the corresponding model-checking problem: although complete for exponential time in the general case, we find natural restrictions on grammars for our applications and establish complexities ranging from nondeterministic polynomial time to polynomial space in the relevant cases.Comment: 21 + x page

PDL with Intersection and Converse is 2EXP-complete

The logic ICPDL is the expressive extension of Propositional Dynamic Logic (PDL), which admits intersection and converse as program operators. The result of this paper is containment of ICPDL-satisfiability in $2$EXP, which improves the previously known non-elementary upper bound and implies $2$EXP-completeness due to an existing lower bound for PDL with intersection (IPDL). The proof proceeds showing that every satisfiable ICPDL formula has model of tree width at most two. Next, we reduce satisfiability in ICPDL to $omega$-regular tree satisfiability in ICPDL. In the latter problem the set of possible models is restricted to trees of an $omega$-regular tree language. In the final step,$omega$-regular tree satisfiability is reduced the emptiness problem for alternating two-way automata on infinite trees. In this way, a more elegant proof is obtained for Danecki\u27s difficult result that satisfiability in IPDL is in $2EXP$

PDL with Intersection and Converse is Decidable

In its many guises and variations, propositional dynamic logic (PDL) plays an important role in various areas of computer science such as databases, artificial intelligence, and computer linguistics. One relevant and powerful variation is ICPDL, the extension of PDL with intersection and converse. Although ICPDL has several interesting applications, its computational properties have never been investigated. In this paper, we prove that ICPDL is decidable by developing a translation to the monadic second order logic of infinite trees. Our result has applications in information logic, description logic, and epistemic logic. In particular, we solve a long-standing open problem in information logic. Another virtue of our approach is that it provides a decidability proof that is more transparent than existing ones for PDL with intersection (but without converse)

Logical Combinators for Rich Type Systems

We present a functional approach to design rich type systems based on an elegant logical representation of types. The representation is not only clean but avoids exponential increases in combined complexity due to subformula duplication. This opens the way for solving a wide range of problems such as subtyping in exponential-time even though their direct translation into the underlying logic results in an exponential blowup of the formula size, yielding an incorrectly presumed two-exponential time complexity.Nous présentons une approche fonctionnelle pour concevoir des systèmes de types riches basée sur une représentation élégante et logique des types. La représentation n'est pas seulement propre, mais évite une augmentation exponentielle de la complexité en raison de duplication de sous-formules. Cela ouvre la voie pour résoudre un large éventail de problèmes tels que le sous-typage en temps simplement exponentiel, même si leur traduction directe dans la logique sous-jacente produit une explosion combinatoire de la taille de la formule, donnant une complexité en temps incorrectement présumée doublement exponentielle

A Non-wellfounded, Labelled Proof System for Propositional Dynamic Logic

We define a infinitary labelled sequent calculus for PDL, G3PDL^{\infty}. A finitarily representable cyclic system, G3PDL^{\omega}, is then given. We show that both are sound and complete with respect to standard models of PDL and, further, that G3PDL^{\infty} is cut-free complete. We additionally investigate proof-search strategies in the cyclic system for the fragment of PDL without tests

A Decision Procedure for XPath Containment

XPath is the standard language for addressing parts of an XML document. We present a sound and complete decision procedure for containment of XPath queries. The considered XPath fragment covers most of the language features used in practice. Specifically, we show how XPath queries can be translated into equivalent formulas in monadic second-order logic. Using this translation, we construct an optimized logical formulation of the containment problem, which is decided using tree automata. When the containment relation does not hold between two XPath expressions, a counter-example XML tree is generated. We provide a complexity analysis together with practical experiments that illustrate the efficiency of the decision procedure for realistic scenarios

Operator Precedence Languages: Their Automata-Theoretic and Logic Characterization

Operator precedence languages were introduced half a century ago by Robert Floyd to support deterministic and efficient parsing of context-free languages. Recently, we renewed our interest in this class of languages thanks to a few distinguishing properties that make them attractive for exploiting various modern technologies. Precisely, their local parsability enables parallel and incremental parsing, whereas their closure properties make them amenable to automatic verification techniques, including model checking. In this paper we provide a fairly complete theory of this class of languages: we introduce a class of automata with the same recognizing power as the generative power of their grammars; we provide a characterization of their sentences in terms of monadic second-order logic as has been done in previous literature for more restricted language classes such as regular, parenthesis, and input-driven ones; we investigate preserved and lost properties when extending the language sentences from finite length to infinite length ($omega$-languages). As a result, we obtain a class of languages that enjoys many of the nice properties of regular languages (closure and decidability properties, logic characterization) but is considerably larger than other families---typically parenthesis and input-driven ones---with the same properties, covering “almost” all deterministic languages