1,206 research outputs found
Synchronizing Strongly Connected Partial DFAs
We study synchronizing partial DFAs, which extend the classical concept of
synchronizing complete DFAs and are a special case of synchronizing unambiguous
NFAs. A partial DFA is called synchronizing if it has a word (called a reset
word) whose action brings a non-empty subset of states to a unique state and is
undefined for all other states. While in the general case the problem of
checking whether a partial DFA is synchronizing is PSPACE-complete, we show
that in the strongly connected case this problem can be efficiently reduced to
the same problem for a complete DFA. Using combinatorial, algebraic, and formal
languages methods, we develop techniques that relate main synchronization
problems for strongly connected partial DFAs with the same problems for
complete DFAs. In particular, this includes the \v{C}ern\'{y} and the rank
conjectures, the problem of finding a reset word, and upper bounds on the
length of the shortest reset words of literal automata of finite prefix codes.
We conclude that solving fundamental synchronization problems is equally hard
in both models, as an essential improvement of the results for one model
implies an improvement for the other.Comment: Full version of the paper at STACS 202
Large Aperiodic Semigroups
The syntactic complexity of a regular language is the size of its syntactic
semigroup. This semigroup is isomorphic to the transition semigroup of the
minimal deterministic finite automaton accepting the language, that is, to the
semigroup generated by transformations induced by non-empty words on the set of
states of the automaton. In this paper we search for the largest syntactic
semigroup of a star-free language having left quotients; equivalently, we
look for the largest transition semigroup of an aperiodic finite automaton with
states.
We introduce two new aperiodic transition semigroups. The first is generated
by transformations that change only one state; we call such transformations and
resulting semigroups unitary. In particular, we study complete unitary
semigroups which have a special structure, and we show that each maximal
unitary semigroup is complete. For there exists a complete unitary
semigroup that is larger than any aperiodic semigroup known to date.
We then present even larger aperiodic semigroups, generated by
transformations that map a non-empty subset of states to a single state; we
call such transformations and semigroups semiconstant. In particular, we
examine semiconstant tree semigroups which have a structure based on full
binary trees. The semiconstant tree semigroups are at present the best
candidates for largest aperiodic semigroups.
We also prove that is an upper bound on the state complexity of
reversal of star-free languages, and resolve an open problem about a special
case of state complexity of concatenation of star-free languages.Comment: 22 pages, 1 figure, 2 table
DFAs and PFAs with Long Shortest Synchronizing Word Length
It was conjectured by \v{C}ern\'y in 1964, that a synchronizing DFA on
states always has a shortest synchronizing word of length at most ,
and he gave a sequence of DFAs for which this bound is reached. Until now a
full analysis of all DFAs reaching this bound was only given for ,
and with bounds on the number of symbols for . Here we give the full
analysis for , without bounds on the number of symbols.
For PFAs the bound is much higher. For we do a similar analysis as
for DFAs and find the maximal shortest synchronizing word lengths, exceeding
for . For arbitrary n we give a construction of a PFA on
three symbols with exponential shortest synchronizing word length, giving
significantly better bounds than earlier exponential constructions. We give a
transformation of this PFA to a PFA on two symbols keeping exponential shortest
synchronizing word length, yielding a better bound than applying a similar
known transformation.Comment: 16 pages, 2 figures source code adde
Unrestricted State Complexity of Binary Operations on Regular and Ideal Languages
We study the state complexity of binary operations on regular languages over
different alphabets. It is known that if and are languages of
state complexities and , respectively, and restricted to the same
alphabet, the state complexity of any binary boolean operation on and
is , and that of product (concatenation) is . In
contrast to this, we show that if and are over different
alphabets, the state complexity of union and symmetric difference is
, that of difference is , that of intersection is , and
that of product is . We also study unrestricted complexity of
binary operations in the classes of regular right, left, and two-sided ideals,
and derive tight upper bounds. The bounds for product of the unrestricted cases
(with the bounds for the restricted cases in parentheses) are as follows: right
ideals (); left ideals ();
two-sided ideals (). The state complexities of boolean operations
on all three types of ideals are the same as those of arbitrary regular
languages, whereas that is not the case if the alphabets of the arguments are
the same. Finally, we update the known results about most complex regular,
right-ideal, left-ideal, and two-sided-ideal languages to include the
unrestricted cases.Comment: 30 pages, 15 figures. This paper is a revised and expanded version of
the DCFS 2016 conference paper, also posted previously as arXiv:1602.01387v3.
The expanded version has appeared in J. Autom. Lang. Comb. 22 (1-3), 29-59,
2017, the issue of selected papers from DCFS 2016. This version corrects the
proof of distinguishability of states in the difference operation on p. 12 in
arXiv:1609.04439v
Learning Moore Machines from Input-Output Traces
The problem of learning automata from example traces (but no equivalence or
membership queries) is fundamental in automata learning theory and practice. In
this paper we study this problem for finite state machines with inputs and
outputs, and in particular for Moore machines. We develop three algorithms for
solving this problem: (1) the PTAP algorithm, which transforms a set of
input-output traces into an incomplete Moore machine and then completes the
machine with self-loops; (2) the PRPNI algorithm, which uses the well-known
RPNI algorithm for automata learning to learn a product of automata encoding a
Moore machine; and (3) the MooreMI algorithm, which directly learns a Moore
machine using PTAP extended with state merging. We prove that MooreMI has the
fundamental identification in the limit property. We also compare the
algorithms experimentally in terms of the size of the learned machine and
several notions of accuracy, introduced in this paper. Finally, we compare with
OSTIA, an algorithm that learns a more general class of transducers, and find
that OSTIA generally does not learn a Moore machine, even when fed with a
characteristic sample
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