In this paper we study the exact comparison complexity of the stringprefix-matching problem in the deterministic sequential comparison modelwith equality tests. We derive almost tight lower and upper bounds onthe number of symbol comparisons required in the worst case by on-lineprefix-matching algorithms for any fixed pattern and variable text. Unlikeprevious results on the comparison complexity of string-matching andprefix-matching algorithms, our bounds are almost tight for any particular pattern.We also consider the special case where the pattern and the text are thesame string. This problem, which we call the string self-prefix problem, issimilar to the pattern preprocessing step of the Knuth-Morris-Pratt string-matchingalgorithm that is used in several comparison efficient string-matchingand prefix-matching algorithms, including in our new algorithm.We obtain roughly tight lower and upper bounds on the number of symbolcomparisons required in the worst case by on-line self-prefix algorithms.Our algorithms can be implemented in linear time and space in thestandard uniform-cost random-access-machine model
