30 research outputs found
A Crevice on the Crane Beach: Finite-Degree Predicates
First-order logic (FO) over words is shown to be equiexpressive with FO
equipped with a restricted set of numerical predicates, namely the order, a
binary predicate MSB, and the finite-degree predicates: FO[Arb] = FO[<,
MSB, Fin].
The Crane Beach Property (CBP), introduced more than a decade ago, is true of
a logic if all the expressible languages admitting a neutral letter are
regular.
Although it is known that FO[Arb] does not have the CBP, it is shown here
that the (strong form of the) CBP holds for both FO[<, Fin] and FO[<, MSB].
Thus FO[<, Fin] exhibits a form of locality and the CBP, and can still express
a wide variety of languages, while being one simple predicate away from the
expressive power of FO[Arb]. The counting ability of FO[<, Fin] is studied as
an application.Comment: Submitte
Continuity of Functional Transducers: A Profinite Study of Rational Functions
A word-to-word function is continuous for a class of languages~
if its inverse maps _languages to~. This notion
provides a basis for an algebraic study of transducers, and was integral to the
characterization of the sequential transducers computable in some circuit
complexity classes.
Here, we report on the decidability of continuity for functional transducers
and some standard classes of regular languages. To this end, we develop a
robust theory rooted in the standard profinite analysis of regular languages.
Since previous algebraic studies of transducers have focused on the sole
structure of the underlying input automaton, we also compare the two algebraic
approaches. We focus on two questions: When are the automaton structure and the
continuity properties related, and when does continuity propagate to
superclasses
Automates à contraintes semilinéaires = Automata with a semilinear constraint
Cette thèse présente une étude dans divers domaines de l'informatique
théorique de modèles de calculs combinant automates finis et contraintes
arithmétiques. Nous nous intéressons aux questions de décidabilité,
d'expressivité et de clôture, tout en ouvrant l'étude à la complexité, la
logique, l'algèbre et aux applications. Cette étude est présentée au travers
de quatre articles de recherche.
Le premier article, Affine Parikh Automata, poursuit l'étude de Klaedtke et Ruess
des automates de Parikh et en définit des généralisations et restrictions.
L'automate de Parikh est un point de départ de cette thèse; nous montrons que
ce modèle de calcul est équivalent à l'automate contraint que nous
définissons comme un automate qui n'accepte un mot que si le nombre de fois
que chaque transition est empruntée répond à une contrainte arithmétique.
Ce modèle est naturellement étendu à l'automate de Parikh affine qui
effectue une opération affine sur un ensemble de registres lors du
franchissement d'une transition. Nous étudions aussi l'automate de
Parikh sur lettres: un automate qui n'accepte un mot que si le nombre de
fois que chaque lettre y apparaît répond à une contrainte arithmétique.
Le deuxième article, Bounded Parikh Automata, étudie les langages
bornés des automates de Parikh. Un langage est borné s'il existe des
mots w_1, w_2, ..., w_k tels que chaque mot du langage peut s'écrire
w_1...w_1w_2...w_2...w_k...w_k. Ces langages sont
importants dans des domaines applicatifs et présentent usuellement de bonnes
propriétés théoriques. Nous montrons que dans le contexte des langages
bornés, le déterminisme n'influence pas l'expressivité des automates de
Parikh.
Le troisième article, Unambiguous Constrained Automata, introduit les
automates contraints non ambigus, c'est-à-dire pour lesquels il
n'existe qu'un chemin acceptant par mot reconnu par l'automate. Nous
montrons qu'il s'agit d'un modèle combinant une meilleure expressivité et de
meilleures propriétés de clôture que l'automate contraint déterministe. Le
problème de déterminer si le langage d'un automate contraint non ambigu est
régulier est montré décidable.
Le quatrième article, Algebra and Complexity Meet Contrained Automata,
présente une étude des représentations algébriques qu'admettent les automates
contraints et les automates de Parikh affines. Nous déduisons de ces
caractérisations des résultats d'expressivité et de complexité. Nous
montrons aussi que certaines hypothèses classiques en complexité
computationelle sont reliées à des résultats de séparation et de non clôture
dans les automates de Parikh affines.
La thèse est conclue par une ouverture à un possible approfondissement, au
travers d'un certain nombre de problèmes ouverts.This thesis presents a study from the theoretical computer science
perspective of computing models combining finite automata and arithmetic
constraints. We focus on decidability questions, expressiveness, and closure
properties, while opening the study to complexity, logic, algebra, and
applications. This thesis is presented through four research articles.
The first article, Affine Parikh Automata, continues the study of Klaedtke
and Ruess on Parikh automata and defines generalizations and restrictions of
this model. The Parikh automaton is one of the starting points of this
thesis. We show that this model of computation is equivalent to the
constrained automaton that we define as an automaton which accepts a word
only if the number of times each transition is taken satisfies a given
arithmetic constraint. This model is naturally extended to affine Parikh
automata, in which an affine transformation is applied to a set of registers
on taking a transition. We also study the Parikh automaton on letters, that
is, an automaton which accepts a word only if the number of times each letter
appears in the word verifies an arithmetic constraint.
The second article, Bounded Parikh Automata, focuses on the
bounded languages of Parikh automata. A language is bounded if there
are words w_1, w_2, ..., w_k such that every word in the language can be
written as w_1...w_1w_2...w_2 ... w_k...w_k. These languages
are important in applications and usually display good theoretical
properties. We show that, over the bounded languages, determinism does not
influence the expressiveness of Parikh automata.
The third article, Unambiguous Constrained Automata, introduces the
concept of unambiguity in constrained automata. An automaton is
unambiguous if there is only one accepting path per word of its language. We
show that the unambiguous constrained automaton is an appealing model of
computation which combines a better expressiveness and better closure
properties than the deterministic constrained automaton. We show that it is
decidable whether the language of an unambiguous constrained automaton is
regular.
The fourth article, Algebra and Complexity Meet Constrained Automata,
presents a study of algebraic representations of constrained automata and
affine Parikh automata. We deduce expressiveness and complexity results from
these characterizations. We also study how classical computational
complexity hypotheses help in showing separations and nonclosure properties
in affine Parikh automata.
The thesis is concluded by a presentation of possible future avenues of
research, through several open problems
Bounded Parikh Automata
The Parikh finite word automaton model (PA) was introduced and studied by
Klaedtke and Ruess in 2003. Here, by means of related models, it is shown that
the bounded languages recognized by PA are the same as those recognized by
deterministic PA. Moreover, this class of languages is the class of bounded
languages whose set of iterations is semilinear.Comment: In Proceedings WORDS 2011, arXiv:1108.341
Weak Cost Register Automata are Still Powerful
We consider one of the weakest variants of cost register automata over a
tropical semiring, namely copyless cost register automata over
with updates using and increments. We show that this model can simulate,
in some sense, the runs of counter machines with zero-tests. We deduce that a
number of problems pertaining to that model are undecidable, in particular
equivalence, disproving a conjecture of Alur et al. from 2012. To emphasize how
weak these machines are, we also show that they can be expressed as a
restricted form of linearly-ambiguous weighted automata.Comment: 16 page
EXTREMELY UNIFORM BRANCHING PROGRAMS
We propose a new descriptive complexity notion of uniformity for branching programs solving problems defined on structured data. We observe that FO[=]-uniform (n-way) branching programs are unable to solve the tree evaluation problem studied by Cook, McKenzie, Wehr, Braverman and Santhanam [8] because such programs possess a variant of their thriftiness property. Similarly, FO[=]-uniform (n-way) branching programs are unable to solve the P-complete GEN problem because such programs possess the incremental property studied by Gál, Kouck´y and McKenzie [10]. 1
On polynomial recursive sequences
International audienceWe study the expressive power of polynomial recursive sequences, a nonlinear extension of the well-known class of linear recursive sequences. These sequences arise naturally in the study of nonlinear extensions of weighted automata, where (non)expressiveness results translate to class separations. A typical example of a polynomial recursive sequence is . Our main result is that the sequence is not polynomial recursive