On the weight distribution of second order Reed-Muller codes and their relatives

The weight distribution of second order $q$-ary Reed-Muller codes have been determined by Sloane and Berlekamp (IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory, vol. IT-16, 1970) for $q=2$ and by McEliece (JPL Space Programs Summary, vol. 3, 1969) for general prime power $q$. Unfortunately, there were some mistakes in the computation of the latter one. This paper aims to provide a precise account for the weight distribution of second order $q$-ary Reed-Muller codes. In addition, the weight distributions of second order $q$-ary homogeneous Reed-Muller codes and second order $q$-ary projective Reed-Muller codes are also determined.Comment: 14 pages, Designs, Codes and Cryptography, Accepted, 201

The Minimum Distance of Some Narrow-Sense Primitive BCH Codes

Due to wide applications of BCH codes, the determination of their minimum distance is of great interest. However, this is a very challenging problem for which few theoretical results have been reported in the last four decades. Even for the narrow-sense primitive BCH codes, which form the most well-studied subclass of BCH codes, there are very few theoretical results on the minimum distance. In this paper, we present new results on the minimum distance of narrow-sense primitive BCH codes with special Bose distance. We prove that for a prime power $q$, the $q$-ary narrow-sense primitive BCH code with length $q^m-1$ and Bose distance $q^m-q^{m-1}-q^i-1$, where $\frac{m-2}{2} \le i \le m-\lfloor \frac{m}{3} \rfloor-1$, has minimum distance $q^m-q^{m-1}-q^i-1$. This is achieved by employing the beautiful theory of sets of quadratic forms, symmetric bilinear forms and alternating bilinear forms over finite fields, which can be best described using the framework of association schemes.Comment: 40 page

Constructions of Primitive Formally Dual Pairs Having Subsets with Unequal Sizes

The concept of formal duality was proposed by Cohn, Kumar and Sch\"urmann, which reflects a remarkable symmetry among energy-minimizing periodic configurations. This formal duality was later on translated into a purely combinatorial property by Cohn, Kumar, Reiher and Sch\"urmann, where the corresponding combinatorial objects were called formally dual pairs. Almost all known examples of primitive formally dual pairs satisfy that the two subsets have the same size. Indeed, prior to this work, there was only one known example having subsets with unequal sizes in $\mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_4^2$. Motivated by this example, we propose a lifting construction framework and a recursive construction framework, which generate new primitive formally dual pairs from known ones. As an application, for $m \ge 2$, we obtain $m+1$ pairwise inequivalent primitive formally dual pairs in $\mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_4^{2m}$, which have subsets with unequal sizes.Comment: Some corrections to version

The Weight Hierarchy of Some Reducible Cyclic Codes

The generalized Hamming weights (GHWs) of linear codes are fundamental parameters, the knowledge of which is of great interest in many applications. However, to determine the GHWs of linear codes is difficult in general. In this paper, we study the GHWs for a family of reducible cyclic codes and obtain the complete weight hierarchy in several cases. This is achieved by extending the idea of \cite{YLFL} into higher dimension and by employing some interesting combinatorial arguments. It shall be noted that these cyclic codes may have arbitrary number of nonzeroes

On the Weight Distribution of Cyclic Codes with Niho Exponents

Recently, there has been intensive research on the weight distributions of cyclic codes. In this paper, we compute the weight distributions of three classes of cyclic codes with Niho exponents. More specifically, we obtain two classes of binary three-weight and four-weight cyclic codes and a class of nonbinary four-weight cyclic codes. The weight distributions follow from the determination of value distributions of certain exponential sums. Several examples are presented to show that some of our codes are optimal and some have the best known parameters

Linking systems of difference sets

A linking system of difference sets is a collection of mutually related group difference sets, whose advantageous properties have been used to extend classical constructions of systems of linked symmetric designs. The central problems are to determine which groups contain a linking system of difference sets, and how large such a system can be. All previous constructive results for linking systems of difference sets are restricted to 2-groups. We use an elementary projection argument to show that neither the McFarland/Dillon nor the Spence construction of difference sets can give rise to a linking system of difference sets in non-2-groups. We make a connection to Kerdock and bent sets, which provides large linking systems of difference sets in elementary abelian 2-groups. We give a new construction for linking systems of difference sets in 2-groups, taking advantage of a previously unrecognized connection with group difference matrices. This construction simplifies and extends prior results, producing larger linking systems than before in certain 2-groups, new linking systems in other 2-groups for which no system was previously known, and the first known examples in nonabelian groups.Comment: 25 pages. Better description of relationship to previous work, especially in Section 3. Shorter proof of Proposition 1.7. Correction of minor error

The Weight Distribution of a Class of Cyclic Codes Related to Hermitian Forms Graphs

The determination of weight distribution of cyclic codes involves evaluation of Gauss sums and exponential sums. Despite of some cases where a neat expression is available, the computation is generally rather complicated. In this note, we determine the weight distribution of a class of reducible cyclic codes whose dual codes may have arbitrarily many zeros. This goal is achieved by building an unexpected connection between the corresponding exponential sums and the spectrums of Hermitian forms graphs.Comment: 4 page

Narrow-Sense BCH Codes over \gf(q) with Length n=qm−1q−1n=\frac{q^m-1}{q-1}

Cyclic codes over finite fields are widely employed in communication systems, storage devices and consumer electronics, as they have efficient encoding and decoding algorithms. BCH codes, as a special subclass of cyclic codes, are in most cases among the best cyclic codes. A subclass of good BCH codes are the narrow-sense BCH codes over \gf(q) with length $n=(q^m-1)/(q-1)$. Little is known about this class of BCH codes when $q>2$. The objective of this paper is to study some of the codes within this class. In particular, the dimension, the minimum distance, and the weight distribution of some ternary BCH codes with length $n=(3^m-1)/2$ are determined in this paper. A class of ternary BCH codes meeting the Griesmer bound is identified. An application of some of the BCH codes in secret sharing is also investigated

Some New Results on the Cross Correlation of mm-sequences

The determination of the cross correlation between an $m$-sequence and its decimated sequence has been a long-standing research problem. Considering a ternary $m$-sequence of period $3^{3r}-1$, we determine the cross correlation distribution for decimations $d=3^{r}+2$ and $d=3^{2r}+2$, where $\gcd(r,3)=1$. Meanwhile, for a binary $m$-sequence of period $2^{2lm}-1$, we make an initial investigation for the decimation $d=\frac{2^{2lm}-1}{2^{m}+1}+2^{s}$, where $l \ge 2$ is even and $0 \le s \le 2m-1$. It is shown that the cross correlation takes at least four values. Furthermore, we confirm the validity of two famous conjectures due to Sarwate et al. and Helleseth in this case

A Direct Construction of Primitive Formally Dual Pairs Having Subsets with Unequal Sizes

The concept of formal duality was proposed by Cohn, Kumar and Sch\"urmann, which reflects a remarkable symmetry among energy-minimizing periodic configurations. This formal duality was later translated into a purely combinatorial property by Cohn, Kumar, Reiher and Sch\"urmann, where the corresponding combinatorial objects were called formally dual pairs. So far, except the results presented in Li and Pott (arXiv:1810.05433v3), we have little information about primitive formally dual pairs having subsets with unequal sizes. In this paper, we propose a direct construction of primitive formally dual pairs having subsets with unequal sizes in $\mathbb{Z}_2 \times \mathbb{Z}_4^{2m}$, where $m \ge 1$. This construction recovers an infinite family obtained in Li and Pott (arXiv:1810.05433v3), which was derived by employing a recursive approach. Although the resulting infinite family was known before, the idea of the direct construction is new and provides more insights which were not known from the recursive approach.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1810.05433. This version contains some minor corrections to version