584 research outputs found
Time and tape complexity of pushdown automaton languages
An algorithm is presented which will determine whether any string w in Σ*, of length n, is contained in a language L ⊆ Σ* defined by a two-way nondeterministic pushdown automation. This algorithm requires time n3 when implemented on a random access computer. It requires n4 time and n2 tape when implemented on a multitape Turing machine.If the pushdown automaton is deterministic, the algorithm requires n2 time on a random access computer and n2 log n time on a multitape Turing machine
One-Tape Turing Machine Variants and Language Recognition
We present two restricted versions of one-tape Turing machines. Both
characterize the class of context-free languages. In the first version,
proposed by Hibbard in 1967 and called limited automata, each tape cell can be
rewritten only in the first visits, for a fixed constant .
Furthermore, for deterministic limited automata are equivalent to
deterministic pushdown automata, namely they characterize deterministic
context-free languages. Further restricting the possible operations, we
consider strongly limited automata. These models still characterize
context-free languages. However, the deterministic version is less powerful
than the deterministic version of limited automata. In fact, there exist
deterministic context-free languages that are not accepted by any deterministic
strongly limited automaton.Comment: 20 pages. This article will appear in the Complexity Theory Column of
the September 2015 issue of SIGACT New
Highly Undecidable Problems For Infinite Computations
We show that many classical decision problems about 1-counter
omega-languages, context free omega-languages, or infinitary rational
relations, are -complete, hence located at the second level of the
analytical hierarchy, and "highly undecidable". In particular, the universality
problem, the inclusion problem, the equivalence problem, the determinizability
problem, the complementability problem, and the unambiguity problem are all
-complete for context-free omega-languages or for infinitary rational
relations. Topological and arithmetical properties of 1-counter
omega-languages, context free omega-languages, or infinitary rational
relations, are also highly undecidable. These very surprising results provide
the first examples of highly undecidable problems about the behaviour of very
simple finite machines like 1-counter automata or 2-tape automata.Comment: to appear in RAIRO-Theoretical Informatics and Application
Simulation of Two-Way Pushdown Automata Revisited
The linear-time simulation of 2-way deterministic pushdown automata (2DPDA)
by the Cook and Jones constructions is revisited. Following the semantics-based
approach by Jones, an interpreter is given which, when extended with
random-access memory, performs a linear-time simulation of 2DPDA. The recursive
interpreter works without the dump list of the original constructions, which
makes Cook's insight into linear-time simulation of exponential-time automata
more intuitive and the complexity argument clearer. The simulation is then
extended to 2-way nondeterministic pushdown automata (2NPDA) to provide for a
cubic-time recognition of context-free languages. The time required to run the
final construction depends on the degree of nondeterminism. The key mechanism
that enables the polynomial-time simulations is the sharing of computations by
memoization.Comment: In Proceedings Festschrift for Dave Schmidt, arXiv:1309.455
Reachability in Higher-Order-Counters
Higher-order counter automata (\HOCS) can be either seen as a restriction of
higher-order pushdown automata (\HOPS) to a unary stack alphabet, or as an
extension of counter automata to higher levels. We distinguish two principal
kinds of \HOCS: those that can test whether the topmost counter value is zero
and those which cannot.
We show that control-state reachability for level \HOCS with -test is
complete for \mbox{}-fold exponential space; leaving out the -test
leads to completeness for \mbox{}-fold exponential time. Restricting
\HOCS (without -test) to level , we prove that global (forward or
backward) reachability analysis is \PTIME-complete. This enhances the known
result for pushdown systems which are subsumed by level \HOCS without
-test.
We transfer our results to the formal language setting. Assuming that \PTIME
\subsetneq \PSPACE \subsetneq \mathbf{EXPTIME}, we apply proof ideas of
Engelfriet and conclude that the hierarchies of languages of \HOPS and of \HOCS
form strictly interleaving hierarchies. Interestingly, Engelfriet's
constructions also allow to conclude immediately that the hierarchy of
collapsible pushdown languages is strict level-by-level due to the existing
complexity results for reachability on collapsible pushdown graphs. This
answers an open question independently asked by Parys and by Kobayashi.Comment: Version with Full Proofs of a paper that appears at MFCS 201
Multi-Head Finite Automata: Characterizations, Concepts and Open Problems
Multi-head finite automata were introduced in (Rabin, 1964) and (Rosenberg,
1966). Since that time, a vast literature on computational and descriptional
complexity issues on multi-head finite automata documenting the importance of
these devices has been developed. Although multi-head finite automata are a
simple concept, their computational behavior can be already very complex and
leads to undecidable or even non-semi-decidable problems on these devices such
as, for example, emptiness, finiteness, universality, equivalence, etc. These
strong negative results trigger the study of subclasses and alternative
characterizations of multi-head finite automata for a better understanding of
the nature of non-recursive trade-offs and, thus, the borderline between
decidable and undecidable problems. In the present paper, we tour a fragment of
this literature
An Experiment in Ping-Pong Protocol Verification by Nondeterministic Pushdown Automata
An experiment is described that confirms the security of a well-studied class
of cryptographic protocols (Dolev-Yao intruder model) can be verified by
two-way nondeterministic pushdown automata (2NPDA). A nondeterministic pushdown
program checks whether the intersection of a regular language (the protocol to
verify) and a given Dyck language containing all canceling words is empty. If
it is not, an intruder can reveal secret messages sent between trusted users.
The verification is guaranteed to terminate in cubic time at most on a
2NPDA-simulator. The interpretive approach used in this experiment simplifies
the verification, by separating the nondeterministic pushdown logic and program
control, and makes it more predictable. We describe the interpretive approach
and the known transformational solutions, and show they share interesting
features. Also noteworthy is how abstract results from automata theory can
solve practical problems by programming language means.Comment: In Proceedings MARS/VPT 2018, arXiv:1803.0866
An in-between "implicit" and "explicit" complexity: Automata
Implicit Computational Complexity makes two aspects implicit, by manipulating
programming languages rather than models of com-putation, and by internalizing
the bounds rather than using external measure. We survey how automata theory
contributed to complexity with a machine-dependant with implicit bounds model
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