The P Versus Np Problem
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Efficient Algorithms with Asymmetric Read and Write Costs
Efficient Algorithms with Asymmetric Read and Write Costs Guy E. Blelloch1, Jeremy T. Fineman2, Phillip B. Gibbons1, Yan Gu1, and Julian Shun3 1 Carnegie Mellon University 2 Georgetown University 3 University of California, Berkeley Abstract In several emerging technologies for computer memory (main memory), the cost of reading is significantly cheaper than the cost of writing. Such asymmetry in memory costs poses a fun- damentally different model from the RAM for algorithm design. In this paper we study lower and upper bounds for various problems under such asymmetric read and write costs. We con- sider both the case in which all but O(1) memory has asymmetric cost, and the case of a small cache of symmetric memory. We model both cases using the (M, ω)-ARAM, in which there is a small (symmetric) memory of size M and a large unbounded (asymmetric) memory, both random access, and where reading from the large memory has unit cost, but writing has cost ω 1. For FFT and sorting networks we show a lower bound cost of Ω(ωn logωM n), which indicates that it is not possible to achieve asymptotic improvements with cheaper reads when ω is bounded by a polynomial in M. Moreover, there is an asymptotic gap (of min(ω, log n)/ log(ωM)) between the cost of sorting networks and comparison sorting in the model. This contrasts with the RAM, and most other models, in which the asymptotic costs are the same. We also show a lower bound for computations on an n × n diamond DAG of Ω(ωn2/M) cost, which indicates no asymptotic improvement is achievable with fast reads. -
Great Ideas in Computing
Great Ideas in Computing University of Toronto CSC196 Winter/Spring 2019 Week 6: October 19-23 (2020) 1 / 17 Announcements I added one final question to Assignment 2. It concerns search engines. The question may need a little clarification. I have also clarified question 1 where I have defined (in a non standard way) the meaning of a strict binary search tree which is what I had in mind. Please answer the question for a strict binary search tree. If you answered the quiz question for a non strict binary search tree withn a proper explanation you will get full credit. Quick poll: how many students feel that Q1 was a fair quiz? A1 has now been graded by Marta. I will scan over the assignments and hope to release the grades later today. If you plan to make a regrading request, you have up to one week to submit your request. You must specify clearly why you feel that a question may not have been graded fairly. In general, students did well which is what I expected. 2 / 17 Agenda for the week We will continue to discuss search engines. We ended on what is slide 10 (in Week 5) on Friday and we will continue with where we left off. I was surprised that in our poll, most students felt that the people advocating the \AI view" of search \won the debate" whereas today I will try to argue that the people (e.g., Salton and others) advocating the \combinatorial, algebraic, statistical view" won the debate as to current search engines. -
The Top Eight Misconceptions About NP- Hardness
The top eight misconceptions about NP- hardness Zoltán Ádám Mann Budapest University of Technology and Economics Department of Computer Science and Information Theory Budapest, Hungary Abstract: The notions of NP-completeness and NP-hardness are used frequently in the computer science literature, but unfortunately, often in a wrong way. The aim of this paper is to show the most wide-spread misconceptions, why they are wrong, and why we should care. Keywords: F.1.3 Complexity Measures and Classes; F.2 Analysis of Algorithms and Problem Complexity; G.2.1.a Combinatorial algorithms; I.1.2.c Analysis of algorithms Published in IEEE Computer, volume 50, issue 5, pages 72-79, May 2017 1. Introduction Recently, I have been working on a survey about algorithmic approaches to virtual machine allocation in cloud data centers [11]. While doing so, I was shocked (again) to see how often the notions of NP-completeness or NP-hardness are used in a faulty, inadequate, or imprecise way in the literature. Here is an example from an – otherwise excellent – paper that appeared recently in IEEE Transactions on Computers, one of the most prestigious journals of the field: “Since the problem is NP-hard, no polynomial time optimal algorithm exists.” This claim, if it were shown to be true, would finally settle the famous P versus NP problem, which is one of the seven Millenium Prize Problems [10]; thus correctly solving it would earn the authors 1 million dollars. But of course, the authors do not attack this problem; the above claim is just an error in the paper. -
Computational Complexity: a Modern Approach
i Computational Complexity: A Modern Approach Draft of a book: Dated January 2007 Comments welcome! Sanjeev Arora and Boaz Barak Princeton University [email protected] Not to be reproduced or distributed without the authors’ permission This is an Internet draft. Some chapters are more finished than others. References and attributions are very preliminary and we apologize in advance for any omissions (but hope you will nevertheless point them out to us). Please send us bugs, typos, missing references or general comments to [email protected] — Thank You!! DRAFT ii DRAFT Chapter 9 Complexity of counting “It is an empirical fact that for many combinatorial problems the detection of the existence of a solution is easy, yet no computationally efficient method is known for counting their number.... for a variety of problems this phenomenon can be explained.” L. Valiant 1979 The class NP captures the difficulty of finding certificates. However, in many contexts, one is interested not just in a single certificate, but actually counting the number of certificates. This chapter studies #P, (pronounced “sharp p”), a complexity class that captures this notion. Counting problems arise in diverse fields, often in situations having to do with estimations of probability. Examples include statistical estimation, statistical physics, network design, and more. Counting problems are also studied in a field of mathematics called enumerative combinatorics, which tries to obtain closed-form mathematical expressions for counting problems. To give an example, in the 19th century Kirchoff showed how to count the number of spanning trees in a graph using a simple determinant computation. Results in this chapter will show that for many natural counting problems, such efficiently computable expressions are unlikely to exist. -
Efficient Algorithms with Asymmetric Read and Write Costs
Efficient Algorithms with Asymmetric Read and Write Costs Guy E. Blelloch1, Jeremy T. Fineman2, Phillip B. Gibbons1, Yan Gu1, and Julian Shun3 1 Carnegie Mellon University 2 Georgetown University 3 University of California, Berkeley Abstract In several emerging technologies for computer memory (main memory), the cost of reading is significantly cheaper than the cost of writing. Such asymmetry in memory costs poses a fun- damentally different model from the RAM for algorithm design. In this paper we study lower and upper bounds for various problems under such asymmetric read and write costs. We con- sider both the case in which all but O(1) memory has asymmetric cost, and the case of a small cache of symmetric memory. We model both cases using the (M, ω)-ARAM, in which there is a small (symmetric) memory of size M and a large unbounded (asymmetric) memory, both random access, and where reading from the large memory has unit cost, but writing has cost ω 1. For FFT and sorting networks we show a lower bound cost of Ω(ωn logωM n), which indicates that it is not possible to achieve asymptotic improvements with cheaper reads when ω is bounded by a polynomial in M. Moreover, there is an asymptotic gap (of min(ω, log n)/ log(ωM)) between the cost of sorting networks and comparison sorting in the model. This contrasts with the RAM, and most other models, in which the asymptotic costs are the same. We also show a lower bound for computations on an n × n diamond DAG of Ω(ωn2/M) cost, which indicates no asymptotic improvement is achievable with fast reads. -
The Complexity Zoo
The Complexity Zoo Scott Aaronson www.ScottAaronson.com LATEX Translation by Chris Bourke [email protected] 417 classes and counting 1 Contents 1 About This Document 3 2 Introductory Essay 4 2.1 Recommended Further Reading ......................... 4 2.2 Other Theory Compendia ............................ 5 2.3 Errors? ....................................... 5 3 Pronunciation Guide 6 4 Complexity Classes 10 5 Special Zoo Exhibit: Classes of Quantum States and Probability Distribu- tions 110 6 Acknowledgements 116 7 Bibliography 117 2 1 About This Document What is this? Well its a PDF version of the website www.ComplexityZoo.com typeset in LATEX using the complexity package. Well, what’s that? The original Complexity Zoo is a website created by Scott Aaronson which contains a (more or less) comprehensive list of Complexity Classes studied in the area of theoretical computer science known as Computa- tional Complexity. I took on the (mostly painless, thank god for regular expressions) task of translating the Zoo’s HTML code to LATEX for two reasons. First, as a regular Zoo patron, I thought, “what better way to honor such an endeavor than to spruce up the cages a bit and typeset them all in beautiful LATEX.” Second, I thought it would be a perfect project to develop complexity, a LATEX pack- age I’ve created that defines commands to typeset (almost) all of the complexity classes you’ll find here (along with some handy options that allow you to conveniently change the fonts with a single option parameters). To get the package, visit my own home page at http://www.cse.unl.edu/~cbourke/. -
LSPACE VS NP IS AS HARD AS P VS NP 1. Introduction in Complexity
LSPACE VS NP IS AS HARD AS P VS NP FRANK VEGA Abstract. The P versus NP problem is a major unsolved problem in com- puter science. This consists in knowing the answer of the following question: Is P equal to NP? Another major complexity classes are LSPACE, PSPACE, ESPACE, E and EXP. Whether LSPACE = P is a fundamental question that it is as important as it is unresolved. We show if P = NP, then LSPACE = NP. Consequently, if LSPACE is not equal to NP, then P is not equal to NP. According to Lance Fortnow, it seems that LSPACE versus NP is easier to be proven. However, with this proof we show this problem is as hard as P versus NP. Moreover, we prove the complexity class P is not equal to PSPACE as a direct consequence of this result. Furthermore, we demonstrate if PSPACE is not equal to EXP, then P is not equal to NP. In addition, if E = ESPACE, then P is not equal to NP. 1. Introduction In complexity theory, a function problem is a computational problem where a single output is expected for every input, but the output is more complex than that of a decision problem [6]. A functional problem F is defined as a binary relation (x; y) 2 R over strings of an arbitrary alphabet Σ: R ⊂ Σ∗ × Σ∗: A Turing machine M solves F if for every input x such that there exists a y satisfying (x; y) 2 R, M produces one such y, that is M(x) = y [6]. -
Lecture 9 1 Interactive Proof Systems/Protocols
CS 282A/MATH 209A: Foundations of Cryptography Prof. Rafail Ostrovsky Lecture 9 Lecture date: March 7-9, 2005 Scribe: S. Bhattacharyya, R. Deak, P. Mirzadeh 1 Interactive Proof Systems/Protocols 1.1 Introduction The traditional mathematical notion of a proof is a simple passive protocol in which a prover P outputs a complete proof to a verifier V who decides on its validity. The interaction in this traditional sense is minimal and one-way, prover → verifier. The observation has been made that allowing the verifier to interact with the prover can have advantages, for example proving the assertion faster or proving more expressive languages. This extension allows for the idea of interactive proof systems (protocols). The general framework of the interactive proof system (protocol) involves a prover P with an exponential amount of time (computationally unbounded) and a verifier V with a polyno- mial amount of time. Both P and V exchange multiple messages (challenges and responses), usually dependent upon outcomes of fair coin tosses which they may or may not share. It is easy to see that since V is a poly-time machine (PPT), only a polynomial number of messages may be exchanged between the two. P ’s objective is to convince (prove to) the verifier the truth of an assertion, e.g., claimed knowledge of a proof that x ∈ L. V either accepts or rejects the interaction with the P . 1.2 Definition of Interactive Proof Systems An interactive proof system for a language L is a protocol PV for communication between a computationally unbounded (exponential time) machine P and a probabilistic poly-time (PPT) machine V such that the protocol satisfies the properties of completeness and sound- ness. -
QP Versus NP
QP versus NP Frank Vega Joysonic, Belgrade, Serbia [email protected] Abstract. Given an instance of XOR 2SAT and a positive integer 2K , the problem exponential exclusive-or 2-satisfiability consists in deciding whether this Boolean formula has a truth assignment with at leat K satisfiable clauses. We prove exponential exclusive-or 2-satisfiability is in QP and NP-complete. In this way, we show QP ⊆ NP . Keywords: Complexity Classes · Completeness · Logarithmic Space · Nondeterministic · XOR 2SAT. 1 Introduction The P versus NP problem is a major unsolved problem in computer science [4]. This is considered by many to be the most important open problem in the field [4]. It is one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems selected by the Clay Mathematics Institute to carry a US$1,000,000 prize for the first correct solution [4]. It was essentially mentioned in 1955 from a letter written by John Nash to the United States National Security Agency [1]. However, the precise statement of the P = NP problem was introduced in 1971 by Stephen Cook in a seminal paper [4]. In 1936, Turing developed his theoretical computational model [14]. The deterministic and nondeterministic Turing machines have become in two of the most important definitions related to this theoretical model for computation [14]. A deterministic Turing machine has only one next action for each step defined in its program or transition function [14]. A nondeterministic Turing machine could contain more than one action defined for each step of its program, where this one is no longer a function, but a relation [14]. -
P Versus NP Richard M. Karp
P Versus NP Computational complexity theory is the branch of theoretical computer science concerned with the fundamental limits on the efficiency of automatic computation. It focuses on problems that appear to Richard M. Karp require a very large number of computation steps for their solution. The inputs and outputs to a problem are sequences of symbols drawn from a finite alphabet; there is no limit on the length of the input, and the fundamental question about a problem is the rate of growth of the number of required computation steps as a function of the length of the input. Some problems seem to require a very rapidly growing number of steps. One such problem is the inde- pendent set problem: given a graph, consisting of points called vertices and lines called edges connect- ing pairs of vertices, a set of vertices is called independent if no two vertices in the set are connected by a line. Given a graph and a positive integer n, the problem is to decide whether the graph contains an independent set of size n. Every known algorithm to solve the independent set problem encounters a combinatorial explosion, in which the number of required computation steps grows exponentially as a function of the size of the graph. On the other hand, the problem of deciding whether a given set of vertices is an independent set in a given graph is solvable by inspection. There are many such dichotomies, in which it is hard to decide whether a given type of structure exists within an input object (the existence problem), but it is easy to decide whether a given structure is of the required type (the verification problem). -
Lecture 10: Space Complexity III
Space Complexity Classes: NL and L Reductions NL-completeness The Relation between NL and coNL A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Lecture 10: Space Complexity III Arijit Bishnu 27.03.2010 Space Complexity Classes: NL and L Reductions NL-completeness The Relation between NL and coNL A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Outline 1 Space Complexity Classes: NL and L 2 Reductions 3 NL-completeness 4 The Relation between NL and coNL 5 A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Space Complexity Classes: NL and L Reductions NL-completeness The Relation between NL and coNL A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Outline 1 Space Complexity Classes: NL and L 2 Reductions 3 NL-completeness 4 The Relation between NL and coNL 5 A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Definition for Recapitulation S c NPSPACE = c>0 NSPACE(n ). The class NPSPACE is an analog of the class NP. Definition L = SPACE(log n). Definition NL = NSPACE(log n). Space Complexity Classes: NL and L Reductions NL-completeness The Relation between NL and coNL A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Space Complexity Classes Definition for Recapitulation S c PSPACE = c>0 SPACE(n ). The class PSPACE is an analog of the class P. Definition L = SPACE(log n). Definition NL = NSPACE(log n). Space Complexity Classes: NL and L Reductions NL-completeness The Relation between NL and coNL A Relation Among the Complexity Classes Space Complexity Classes Definition for Recapitulation S c PSPACE = c>0 SPACE(n ). The class PSPACE is an analog of the class P. Definition for Recapitulation S c NPSPACE = c>0 NSPACE(n ). -
A Short History of Computational Complexity
The Computational Complexity Column by Lance FORTNOW NEC Laboratories America 4 Independence Way, Princeton, NJ 08540, USA [email protected] http://www.neci.nj.nec.com/homepages/fortnow/beatcs Every third year the Conference on Computational Complexity is held in Europe and this summer the University of Aarhus (Denmark) will host the meeting July 7-10. More details at the conference web page http://www.computationalcomplexity.org This month we present a historical view of computational complexity written by Steve Homer and myself. This is a preliminary version of a chapter to be included in an upcoming North-Holland Handbook of the History of Mathematical Logic edited by Dirk van Dalen, John Dawson and Aki Kanamori. A Short History of Computational Complexity Lance Fortnow1 Steve Homer2 NEC Research Institute Computer Science Department 4 Independence Way Boston University Princeton, NJ 08540 111 Cummington Street Boston, MA 02215 1 Introduction It all started with a machine. In 1936, Turing developed his theoretical com- putational model. He based his model on how he perceived mathematicians think. As digital computers were developed in the 40's and 50's, the Turing machine proved itself as the right theoretical model for computation. Quickly though we discovered that the basic Turing machine model fails to account for the amount of time or memory needed by a computer, a critical issue today but even more so in those early days of computing. The key idea to measure time and space as a function of the length of the input came in the early 1960's by Hartmanis and Stearns.