The Cost of the Missing Bit: Communication Complexity with Help

Dedicated to the Memory of Paul Erdős We generalize the multiparty communication model of Chandra, Furst, and Lipton (1983) to functions with b-bit output (b = 1 in the CFL model). We allow the players to receive up to b - 1 bits of information from an all-powerful benevolent Helper who can see all the input. Extending results of Babai, Nisan, and Szegedy (1992) to this model, we construct families of explicit functions for which bits of communication are required to find the "missing bit", where n is the length of each player's input and k is the number of players. As a consequence we settle the problem of separating the one-way vs. multiround communication complexities (in the CFL sense) for players, extending a result of Nisan and Wigderson (1991) who demonstrated this separation for k = 3 players. As a by-product we obtain lower bounds for the multiparty complexity (in the CFL sense) of new families of explicit boolean functions (not derivable from BNS). The proofs exploit the interplay between two concepts of multicolor discrepancy; discrete Fourier analysis is the basic tool. We also include an unpublished lower bound by A. Wigderson regarding the one-way complexity of the 3-party pointer jumping function. Received November 12, 1998 RID="*" ID="*" Supported in part by NSA grant MSPR-96G-184. RID="†" ID="†" Supported in part by an NSF Graduate Fellowship.     

Isosceles Triangles Determined by a Planar Point Set

 It is proved that, for any ɛ>0 and n>n ₀(ɛ), every set of n points in the plane has at most triples that induce isosceles triangles. (Here e denotes the base of the natural logarithm, so the exponent is roughly 2.136.) This easily implies the best currently known lower bound, , for the smallest number of distinct distances determined by n points in the plane, due to Solymosi–Cs. Tóth and Tardos. Received: February, 2002 Final version received: September 15, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by NSF grant CCR-00-86013, PSC-CUNY Research Award 63382-00-32, and OTKA-T-032452 RID="†" ID="†" Supported by OTKA-T-030059 and AKP 2000-78-21     

Locally Well-Dominated and Locally Independent Well-Dominated Graphs

 In this article we present characterizations of locally well-dominated graphs and locally independent well-dominated graphs, and a sufficient condition for a graph to be k-locally independent well-dominated. Using these results we show that the irredundance number, the domination number and the independent domination number can be computed in polynomial time within several classes of graphs, e.g., the class of locally well-dominated graphs. Received: September 13, 2001 Final version received: May 17, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by the INTAS and the Belarus Government (Project INTAS-BELARUS 97-0093) RID="†" ID="†" Supported by RUTCOR RID="*" ID="*" Supported by the INTAS and the Belarus Government (Project INTAS-BELARUS 97-0093) 05C75, 05C69 Acknowledgments. The authors thank the referees for valuable suggestions.     

On the geometry,preemptions and complexity of multiprocessor and shop scheduling

In this paper we study multiprocessor and open shop scheduling problems from several points of view. We explore a tight dependence of the polynomial solvability/intractability on the number of allowed preemptions. For an exhaustive interrelation, we address the geometry of problems by means of a novel graphical representation. We use the so-called preemption and machine-dependency graphs for preemptive multiprocessor and shop scheduling problems, respectively. In a natural manner, we call a scheduling problem acyclic if the corresponding graph is acyclic. There is a substantial interrelation between the structure of these graphs and the complexity of the problems. Acyclic scheduling problems are quite restrictive; at the same time, many of them still remain NP-hard. We believe that an exhaustive study of acyclic scheduling problems can lead to a better understanding and give a better insight of general scheduling problems. We show that not only acyclic but also a special non-acyclic version of periodic job-shop scheduling can be solved in polynomial (linear) time. In that version, the corresponding machine dependency graph is allowed to have a special type of the so-called parti-colored cycles. We show that trivial extensions of this problem become NP-hard. Then we suggest a linear-time algorithm for the acyclic open-shop problem in which at most m−2 preemptions are allowed, where m is the number of machines. This result is also tight, as we show that if we allow one less preemption, then this strongly restricted version of the classical open-shop scheduling problem becomes NP-hard. In general, we show that very simple acyclic shop scheduling problems are NP-hard. As an example, any flow-shop problem with a single job with three operations and the rest of the jobs with a single non-zero length operation is NP-hard. We suggest linear-time approximation algorithm with the worst-case performance of ( , respectively) for acyclic job-shop (open-shop, respectively), where (‖ℳ‖, respectively) is the maximal job length (machine load, respectively). We show that no algorithm for scheduling acyclic job-shop can guarantee a better worst-case performance than . We consider two special cases of the acyclic job-shop with the so-called short jobs and short operations (restricting the maximal job and operation length) and solve them optimally in linear time. We show that scheduling m identical processors with at most m−2 preemptions is NP-hard, whereas a venerable early linear-time algorithm by McNaughton yields m−1 preemptions. Another multiprocessor scheduling problem we consider is that of scheduling m unrelated processors with an additional restriction that the processing time of any job on any machine is no more than the optimal schedule makespan C _max^*. We show that the (2m−3)-preemptive version of this problem is polynomially solvable, whereas the (2m−4)-preemptive version becomes NP-hard. For general unrelated processors, we guarantee near-optimal (2m−3)-preemptive schedules. The makespan of such a schedule is no more than either the corresponding non-preemptive schedule makespan or max {C _max^*,p _max}, where C _max^* is the optimal (preemptive) schedule makespan and p _max is the maximal job processing time. E.V. Shchepin was partially supported by the program “Algebraical and combinatorial methods of mathematical cybernetics” of the Russian Academy of Sciences. N. Vakhania was partially supported by CONACyT grant No. 48433.     

The Erdős–Pósa Property for Odd Cycles in Highly Connected Graphs

Dedicated to the memory of Paul Erdős In [9] Thomassen proved that a -connected graph either contains k vertex disjoint odd cycles or an odd cycle cover containing at most 2k-2 vertices, i.e. he showed that the Erdős–Pósa property holds for odd cycles in highly connected graphs. In this paper, we will show that the above statement is still valid for 576k-connected graphs which is essentially best possible. Received November 17, 1999 RID="*" ID="*" This work was supported by a post-doctoral DONET grant. RID="†" ID="†" This work was supported by an NSF-CNRS collaborative research grant. RID="‡" ID="‡" This work was performed while both authors were visiting the LIRMM, Université de Montpellier II, France.     

Ramsey-type Theorems with Forbidden Subgraphs

Dedicated to the memory of Paul Erdős   A graph is called H-free if it contains no induced copy of H. We discuss the following question raised by Erdős and Hajnal. Is it true that for every graph H, there exists an such that any H-free graph with n vertices contains either a complete or an empty subgraph of size at least ? We answer this question in the affirmative for a special class of graphs, and give an equivalent reformulation for tournaments. In order to prove the equivalence, we establish several Ramsey type results for tournaments. Received August 22, 1999 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by a USA Israeli BSF grant, by a grant from the Israel Science Foundation and by the Hermann Minkowski Minerva Center for Geometry at Tel Aviv University. RID="†" ID="†" Supported by NSF grant CR-9732101, PSC-CUNY Research Award 663472, and OTKA-T-020914. RID="‡" ID="‡" Supported by TKI grant Stochastics@TUB, and OTKA-T-026203.     

On the Knowledge Complexity of

We show that if a language has an interactive proof of logarithmic statistical knowledge-complexity, then it belongs to the class . Thus, if the polynomial time hierarchy does not collapse, then -complete languages do not have logarithmic knowledge complexity. Prior to this work, there was no indication that would contradict languages being proven with even one bit of knowledge. Our result is a common generalization of two previous results: The first asserts that statistical zero knowledge is contained in [11, 2], while the second asserts that the languages recognizable in logarithmic statistical knowledge complexity are in [19]. Next, we consider the relation between the error probability and the knowledge complexity of an interactive proof. Note that reducing the error probability via repetition is not free: it may increase the knowledge complexity. We show that if the negligible error probability is less than (where k(n) is the knowledge complexity) then the language proven is in the third level of the polynomial time hierarchy (specifically, it is in ). In the standard setting of negligible error probability, there exist PSPACE-complete languages which have sub-linear knowledge complexity. However, if we insist, for example, that the error probability is less than , then PSPACE-complete languages do not have sub-quadratic knowledge complexity, unless . In order to prove our main result, we develop an AM protocol for checking that a samplable distribution D has a given entropy h. For any fractions , the verifier runs in time polynomial in and and fails with probability at most to detect an additive error in the entropy. We believe that this protocol is of independent interest. Subsequent to our work Goldreich and Vadhan [16] established that the problem of comparing the entropies of two samplable distributions if they are noticeably different is a natural complete promise problem for the class of statistical zero knowledge (). Received January 6, 2000 RID=" " ID=" " This research was performed while the authors were visiting the Computer Science Department at the University of Toronto, preliminary version of this paper appeared in [27] RID="*" ID="*" Partially supported by Technion V. P. R. Found––N. Haar and R. Zinn Research Fund. RID="†" ID="†" Partially supported by the grants OTKA T-029255, T-030059, FKFP 0607/1999, and AKP 2000-78 2.1.     

Vertex Covers by Edge Disjoint Cliques

Dedicated to the memory of Paul Erdős Let H be a simple graph having no isolated vertices. An (H,k)-vertex-cover of a simple graph G = (V,E) is a collection of subgraphs of G satisfying 1.  , for all i = 1, ..., r, 2.  , 3.  , for all , and 4.  each is in at most k of the . We consider the existence of such vertex covers when H is a complete graph, , in the context of extremal and random graphs. Received October 31, 1999 RID="*" ID="*" Supported in part by NSF grant DMS-9627408. RID="†" ID="†" Supported in part by NSF grant CCR-9530974. RID="‡" ID="‡" Supported in part by OTKA Grants T 030059 and T 29074, FKFP 0607/1999 and by the Bolyai Foundation. RID="§" ID="§" Supported in part by NSF grant DMS-9970622.     

The Circular Flow Number of a 6-Edge Connected Graph is Less Than Four

We show that every 6-edge connected graph admits a circulation whose range lies in the interval [1,3). Received March 29, 2000 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by NATO-CNR Fellowship; this work was done while the author was visiting the Dept. of Mathematics and Statistics at Simon Fraser University, Canada. RID="†" ID="†" Supported by a National Sciences and Engineering Research Council Research Grant     

Packet routing and job-shop scheduling inO(congestion+dilation) steps

In this paper, we prove that there exists a schedule for routing any set of packets with edge-simple paths, on any network, inO(c+d) steps, wherec is the congestion of the paths in the network, andd is the length of the longest path. The result has applications to packet routing in parallel machines, network emulations, and job-shop scheduling.This research was conducted while the authors were at MIT. Support was provided by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency under Contract N00014-87-K-825, the Office of Naval Research under Contract N00014-86-K-0593, the Air Force under Contract OSR-86-0076, and the Army under Contract DAAL-03-86-K-0171. Tom Leighton is supported by an NSF Presidential Young Investigator Award with matching funds provided by IBM.     

Separating Cycles in Doubly Toroidal Embeddings

 We show that every 4-representative graph embedding in the double torus contains a noncontractible cycle that separates the surface into two pieces. As a special case, every triangulation of the double torus in which every noncontractible cycle has length at least 4 has a noncontractible cycle that separates the surface into two pieces. Received: May 22, 2001 Final version received: August 22, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by NSF Grants Numbers DMS-9622780 and DMS-0070613 RID="†" ID="†" Supported by NSF Grants Numbers DMS-9622780 and DMS-0070430     

Combinatorial and Arithmetical Properties of Linear Numeration Systems

Dedicated to the memory of Paul Erdős We extend a result of J. Alexander and D. Zagier on the Garsia entropy of the Erdős measure. Our investigation heavily relies on methods from combinatorics on words. Furthermore, we introduce a new singular measure related to the Farey tree. Received October 7, 1999 RID="†" ID="†" This author is supported by the START-project Y96-MAT of the Austrian Science Fund RID="‡" ID="‡" This author is supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) grant P14200-MAT RID="*" ID="*" This author is supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) grant S8307-MAT     

Diophantine Approximations and Integer Points of Cones

The purpose of this note is to present a relation between directed best approximations of a rational vector and the elements of the minimal Hilbert basis of certain rational pointed cones. Furthermore, we show that for a special class of these cones the integer Carathéodory property holds true. Received May 6, 1998 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by a "Leibniz Preis" of the German Science Foundation (DFG) awarded to M. Gr?tschel. RID="†" ID="†" Supported by a "Gerhard-Hess-Forschungsf?rderpreis" of the German Science Foundation (DFG).     

On non-permutation solutions to some two machine flow shop scheduling problems

In this paper, we study two versions of the two machine flow shop scheduling problem, where schedule length is to be minimized. First, we consider the two machine flow shop with setup, processing, and removal times separated. It is shown that an optimal solution need not be a permutation schedule, and that the problem isNP-hard in the strong sense, which contradicts some known results. The tight worst-case bound for an optimal permutation solution in proportion to a global optimal solution is shown to be 3/2. An O(n) approximation algorithm with this bound is presented. Secondly, we consider the two machine flow shop with finite storage capacity. Again, it is shown that there may not exist an optimal solution that is a permutation schedule, and that the problem isNP-hard in the strong sense.     

Complexity of shop-scheduling problems with fixed number of jobs: a survey

The paper surveys the complexity results for job shop, flow shop, open shop and mixed shop scheduling problems when the number n of jobs is fixed while the number r of operations per job is not restricted. In such cases, the asymptotical complexity of scheduling algorithms depends on the number m of machines for a flow shop and an open shop problem, and on the numbers m and r for a job shop problem. It is shown that almost all shop-scheduling problems with two jobs can be solved in polynomial time for any regular criterion, while those with three jobs are NP-hard. The only exceptions are the two-job, m-machine mixed shop problem without operation preemptions (which is NP-hard for any non-trivial regular criterion) and the n-job, m-machine open shop problem with allowed operation preemptions (which is polynomially solvable for minimizing makespan).     

On Bipartite Graphs with Linear Ramsey Numbers

Dedicated to the memory of Paul Erdős We provide an elementary proof of the fact that the ramsey number of every bipartite graph H with maximum degree at most is less than . This improves an old upper bound on the ramsey number of the n-cube due to Beck, and brings us closer toward the bound conjectured by Burr and Erdős. Applying the probabilistic method we also show that for all and there exists a bipartite graph with n vertices and maximum degree at most whose ramsey number is greater than for some absolute constant c>1. Received December 1, 1999 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by NSF grant DMS-9704114 RID="**" ID="**" Supported by KBN grant 2 P03A 032 16     

Almost Optimal Dispersers

A disperser is a bipartite graph with the property that every subset A of of cardinality at least K, has at least fraction of the vertices of as neighbors. Such graphs have many applications in derandomization. Saks, Srinivasan and Zhou presented an explicit construction of a disperser with an almost optimal degree , for every . We extend their result for every parameter . Received November 12, 1998/Revised June 20, 2000 RID="*" ID="*" This work was partially done while the author was at the Department of Computer Science, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel. This work was supported by a Phil Zacharia postdoctoral fellowship.     

Graph Orientations with Edge-connection and Parity Constraints

Parity (matching theory) and connectivity (network flows) are two main branches of combinatorial optimization. In an attempt to understand better their interrelation, we study a problem where both parity and connectivity requirements are imposed. The main result is a characterization of undirected graphs G = (V,E) having a k-edge-connected T-odd orientation for every subset with |E| + |T| even. (T-odd orientation: the in-degree of v is odd precisely if v is in T.) As a corollary, we obtain that every (2k)-edge-connected graph with |V| + |E| even has a (k-1)-edge-connected orientation in which the in-degree of every node is odd. Along the way, a structural characterization will be given for digraphs with a root-node s having k edge-disjoint paths from s to every node and k-1 edge-disjoint paths from every node to s. Received December 14, 1998/Revised January 12, 2001 RID="*" ID="*" Supported by the Hungarian National Foundation for Scientific Research, OTKA T029772. Part of research was done while this author was visiting EPFL, Lausanne, June, 1998. RID="†" ID="†" Supported by the Hungarian National Foundation for Scientific Research, OTKA T029772 and OTKA T030059.     

An approximation algorithm for the m-machine permutation flow shop scheduling problem with controllable processing times

The paper deals with the m-machine permutation flow shop scheduling problem in which job processing times, along with a processing order, are decision variables. It is assumed that the cost of processing a job on each machine is a linear function of its processing time and the overall schedule cost to be minimized is the total processing cost plus maximum completion time cost. A algorithm for the problem with m = 2 is provided; the best approximation algorithm until now has a worst-case performance ratio equal to . An extension to the m-machine (m ≥2) permutation flow shop problem yields an approximation algorithm with a worst-case bound equal to

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, where is the worst-case performance ratio of a procedure used, in the proposed algorithm, for solving the (pure) sequencing problem. Moreover, examples which achieve this bound for = 1 are also presented.     

Polynomial time approximation schemes for general multiprocessor job shop scheduling

We study preemptive and non-preemptive versions of the general multiprocessor job shop scheduling problem: Given a set of n tasks each consisting of at most μ ordered operations that can be processed on different (possibly all) subsets of m machines with different processing times, compute a schedule (preemptive or non-preemptive, depending on the model) with minimum makespan where operations belonging to the same task have to be scheduled according to the specified order. We propose algorithms for both preemptive and non-preemptive variants of this problem that compute approximate solutions of any positive ε accuracy and run in O(n) time for any fixed values of m, μ, and ε. These results include (as special cases) many recent developments on polynomial time approximation schemes for scheduling jobs on unrelated machines, multiprocessor tasks, and classical open, flow and job shops.