OpenRaiser/Intern-Atlas huggingface dataset:
Programming Discrete Physical Systems
Venue: arXiv cs.PL 2010
Year: 2010

Every algorithm which can be executed on a computer can at least in principle be realized in hardware, i.e. by a discrete physical system. The problem is that up to now there is no programming language by which physical systems can constructively be described. Such tool, however, is essential for the compact description and automatic production of complex systems. This paper introduces a programming language, called Akton-Algebra, which provides the foundation for the complete description of discrete physical systems. The approach originates from the finding that every discrete physical system reduces to a spatiotemporal topological network of nodes, if the functional and metric properties are deleted. A next finding is that there exists a homeomorphism between the topological network and a sequence of symbols representing a program by which the original nodal network can be reconstructed. Providing Akton-Algebra with functionality turns it into a flow-controlled general data processing language, which by introducing clock control and addressing can be further transformed into a classical programming language. Providing Akton-Algebra with metrics, i.e. the shape and size of the components, turns it into a novel hardware system construction language.
Negative Databases for Biometric Data
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2010
Year: 2010

Negative databases - negative representations of a set of data - have been introduced in 2004 to protect the data they contain. Today, no solution is known to constitute biometric negative databases. This is surprising as biometric applications are very demanding of such protection for privacy reasons. The main difficulty comes from the fact that biometric captures of the same trait give different results and comparisons of the stored reference with the fresh captured biometric data has to take into account this variability. In this paper, we give a first answer to this problem by exhibiting a way to create and exploit biometric negative databases.
The Impact of Topology on Byzantine Containment in Stabilization
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2010
Year: 2010

Self-stabilization is an versatile approach to fault-tolerance since it permits a distributed system to recover from any transient fault that arbitrarily corrupts the contents of all memories in the system. Byzantine tolerance is an attractive feature of distributed system that permits to cope with arbitrary malicious behaviors. We consider the well known problem of constructing a maximum metric tree in this context. Combining these two properties prove difficult: we demonstrate that it is impossible to contain the impact of Byzantine nodes in a self-stabilizing context for maximum metric tree construction (strict stabilization). We propose a weaker containment scheme called topology-aware strict stabilization, and present a protocol for computing maximum metric trees that is optimal for this scheme with respect to impossibility result.
Cognitive Radio Transmission under QoS Constraints and Interference Limitations
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

In this paper, the performance of cognitive transmission under quality of service (QoS)constraints and interference limitations is studied. Cognitive secondary users are assumed to initially perform sensing over multiple frequency bands (or equivalently channels) to detect the activities of primary users. Subsequently, they perform transmission in a single channel at variable power and rates depending on the channel sensing decisions and the fading environment. A state transition model is constructed to model this cognitive operation. Statistical limitations on the buffer lengths are imposed to take into account the QoS constraints of the cognitive secondary users. Under such QoS constraints and limitations on the interference caused to the primary users, the maximum throughput is identified by finding the effective capacity of the cognitive radio channel. Optimal power allocation strategies are obtained and the optimal channel selection criterion is identified. The intricate interplay between effective capacity, interference and QoS constraints, channel sensing parameters and reliability, fading, and the number of available frequency bands is investigated through numerical results.
Solution to the Counterfeit Coin Problem and its Generalization
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

This work deals with a classic problem: "Given a set of coins among which there is a counterfeit coin of a different weight, find this counterfeit coin using ordinary balance scales, with the minimum number of weighings possible, and indicate whether it weighs less or more than the rest". The method proposed here not only calculates the minimum number of weighings necessary, but also indicates how to perform these weighings, it is easily mechanizeable and valid for any number of coins. Instructions are also given as to how to generalize the procedure to include cases where there is more than one counterfeit coin.
How to correctly prune tropical trees
Venue: arXiv cs.AI 2010
Year: 2010

We present tropical games, a generalization of combinatorial min-max games based on tropical algebras. Our model breaks the traditional symmetry of rational zero-sum games where players have exactly opposed goals (min vs. max), is more widely applicable than min-max and also supports a form of pruning, despite it being less effective than alpha-beta. Actually, min-max games may be seen as particular cases where both the game and its dual are tropical: when the dual of a tropical game is also tropical, the power of alpha-beta is completely recovered. We formally develop the model and prove that the tropical pruning strategy is correct, then conclude by showing how the problem of approximated parsing can be modeled as a tropical game, profiting from pruning.
Fast Digital Convolutions using Bit-Shifts
Venue: arXiv cs.NA 2010
Year: 2010

An exact, one-to-one transform is presented that not only allows digital circular convolutions, but is free from multiplications and quantisation errors for transform lengths of arbitrary powers of two. The transform is analogous to the Discrete Fourier Transform, with the canonical harmonics replaced by a set of cyclic integers computed using only bit-shifts and additions modulo a prime number. The prime number may be selected to occupy contemporary word sizes or to be very large for cryptographic or data hiding applications. The transform is an extension of the Rader Transforms via Carmichael's Theorem. These properties allow for exact convolutions that are impervious to numerical overflow and to utilise Fast Fourier Transform algorithms.
Channel State Feedback over the MIMO-MAC
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

We consider the problem of designing low latency and low complexity schemes for channel state feedback over the MIMO-MAC (multiple-input multiple-output multiple access channel). We develop a framework for analyzing this problem in terms of minimizing the MSE distortion, and come up with separated source-channel schemes and joint source-channel schemes that perform better than analog feedback. We also develop a strikingly simple code design based on scalar quantization and uncoded QAM modulation that achieves the theoretical asymptotic performance limit of the separated approach with very low complexity and latency, in the case of single-antenna users.
A Real Time Optimistic Strategy to achieve Concurrency Control in Mobile Environments Using On-demand Multicasting
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2010
Year: 2010

In mobile database environments, multiple users may access similar data items irrespective of their physical location leading to concurrent access anomalies. As disconnections and mobility are the common characteristics in mobile environment, performing concurrent access to a particular data item leads to inconsistency. Most of the approaches use locking mechanisms to achieve concurrency control. However this leads to increase in blocking and abort rate. In this paper an optimistic concurrency control strategy using on-demand multicasting is proposed for mobile database environments which guarantees consistency and introduces application-specific conflict detection and resolution strategies. The simulation results specify increase in system throughput by reducing the transaction abort rates as compared to the other optimistic strategies proposed in literature.
A UI Design Case Study and a Prototype of a Travel Search Engine
Venue: arXiv cs.SE 2010
Year: 2010

We review a case study of a UI design project for a complete travel search engine system prototype for regular and corporate users. We discuss various usage scenarios, guidelines, and so for, and put them into a web-based prototype with screenshots and the like. We combined into our prototype the best features found at the time (2002) on most travel-like sites and added more to them as a part of our research. We conducted feasibility studies, review common design guidelines and Nelson's heuristics while constructing this work. The prototype is itself open-source, but has no backend functionality, as the focus is the user-centered design of such a system. While the prototype is mostly static, some dynamic activity is present through the use of PHP.
Robustness and Generalization
Venue: arXiv cs.LG 2010
Year: 2010

We derive generalization bounds for learning algorithms based on their robustness: the property that if a testing sample is "similar" to a training sample, then the testing error is close to the training error. This provides a novel approach, different from the complexity or stability arguments, to study generalization of learning algorithms. We further show that a weak notion of robustness is both sufficient and necessary for generalizability, which implies that robustness is a fundamental property for learning algorithms to work.
Sparse Multipath Channel Estimation using DS Algorithm in Wideband Communication Systems
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

Wideband wireless channel is a time dispersive channel and becomes strongly frequency-selective. However, in most cases, the channel is composed of a few dominant taps and a large part of taps is approximately zero or zero. They are often called sparse multi-path channels (MPC). Conventional linear MPC methods, such as the least squares (LS), do not exploit the sparsity of MPC. In general, accurate sparse MPC estimator can be obtained by solving a LASSO problem even in the presence of noise. In this paper, a novel CS-based sparse MPC method by using Dantzig selector (DS) [1] is introduced. This method exploits a channel's sparsity to reduce the number of training sequence and, hence, increase spectral efficiency when compared to existed methods with computer simulations.
A Simple Computational Model for Acceptance/Rejection of Binary Sequence Generators
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2010
Year: 2010

A simple binary model to compute the degree of balancedness in the output sequence of LFSR-combinational generators has been developed. The computational method is based exclusively on the handling of binary strings by means of logic operations. The proposed model can serve as a deterministic alternative to existing probabilistic methods for checking balancedness in binary sequence generators. The procedure here described can be devised as a first selective criterium for acceptance/rejection of this type of generators.
A Note on Ordinal DFAs
Venue: arXiv cs.FL 2010
Year: 2010

We prove the following theorem. Suppose that $M$ is a trim DFA on the Boolean alphabet $0,1$. The language $Ł(M)$ is well-ordered by the lexicographic order $\slex$ iff whenever the non sink states $q,q.0$ are in the same strong component, then $q.1$ is a sink. It is easy to see that this property is sufficient. In order to show the necessity, we analyze the behavior of a $\slex$-descending sequence of words. This property is used to obtain a polynomial time algorithm to determine, given a DFA $M$, whether $Ł(M)$ is well-ordered by the lexicographic order. Last, we apply an argument in \cite{BE,BEa} to give a proof that the least nonregular ordinal is $ω^ω$.
Mosaic: Policy Homomorphic Network Extension
Venue: arXiv cs.NI 2010
Year: 2010

With the advent of large-scale cloud computing infrastructure, network extension and migration has emerged as a major challenge in the management of modern enterprise networks. Many enterprises are considering extending or relocating their network components, in whole or in part, to remote, private and public data centers, in order to attain scalability, failure resilience, and cost savings for their network applications. In this paper, we conduct a first rigorous study on the extension and migration of an enterprise network while preserving its performance and security requirements, such as layer 2/layer 3 reachability, and middle-box traversal through load balancer, intrusion detection and ACLs. We formulate this increasingly important problem, present preliminary designs, and conduct experiments to validate the feasibility of our designs.
Deploying Wireless Networks with Beeps
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2010
Year: 2010

We present the \emph{discrete beeping} communication model, which assumes nodes have minimal knowledge about their environment and severely limited communication capabilities. Specifically, nodes have no information regarding the local or global structure of the network, don't have access to synchronized clocks and are woken up by an adversary. Moreover, instead on communicating through messages they rely solely on carrier sensing to exchange information. We study the problem of \emph{interval coloring}, a variant of vertex coloring specially suited for the studied beeping model. Given a set of resources, the goal of interval coloring is to assign every node a large contiguous fraction of the resources, such that neighboring nodes share no resources. To highlight the importance of the discreteness of the model, we contrast it against a continuous variant described in [17]. We present an O(1$ time algorithm that terminates with probability 1 and assigns an interval of size $Ω(T/Δ)$ that repeats every $T$ time units to every node of the network. This improves an $O(\log n)$ time algorithm with the same guarantees presented in \cite{infocom09}, and accentuates the unrealistic assumptions of the continuous model. Under the more realistic discrete model, we present a Las Vegas algorithm that solves $Ω(T/Δ)$-interval coloring in $O(\log n)$ time with high probability and describe how to adapt the algorithm for dynamic networks where nodes may join or leave. For constant degree graphs we prove a lower bound of $Ω(\log n)$ on the time required to solve interval coloring for this model against randomized algorithms. This lower bound implies that our algorithm is asymptotically optimal for constant degree graphs.
On Tractable Exponential Sums
Venue: arXiv cs.CC 2010
Year: 2010

We consider the problem of evaluating certain exponential sums. These sums take the form $\sum_{x_1,...,x_n \in Z_N} e^{f(x_1,...,x_n) {2 πi / N}} $, where each x_i is summed over a ring Z_N, and f(x_1,...,x_n) is a multivariate polynomial with integer coefficients. We show that the sum can be evaluated in polynomial time in n and log N when f is a quadratic polynomial. This is true even when the factorization of N is unknown. Previously, this was known for a prime modulus N. On the other hand, for very specific families of polynomials of degree \ge 3, we show the problem is #P-hard, even for any fixed prime or prime power modulus. This leads to a complexity dichotomy theorem - a complete classification of each problem to be either computable in polynomial time or #P-hard - for a class of exponential sums. These sums arise in the classifications of graph homomorphisms and some other counting CSP type problems, and these results lead to complexity dichotomy theorems. For the polynomial-time algorithm, Gauss sums form the basic building blocks. For the hardness results, we prove group-theoretic necessary conditions for tractability. These tests imply that the problem is #P-hard for even very restricted families of simple cubic polynomials over fixed modulus N.
Secrecy-Achieving Polar-Coding for Binary-Input Memoryless Symmetric Wire-Tap Channels
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

A polar coding scheme is introduced in this paper for the wire-tap channel. It is shown that the provided scheme achieves the entire rate-equivocation region for the case of symmetric and degraded wire-tap channel, where the weak notion of secrecy is assumed. For the particular case of binary erasure wire-tap channel, an alternative proof is given. The case of general non-degraded wire-tap channels is also considered.
Filter Bank Fusion Frames
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

In this paper we characterize and construct novel oversampled filter banks implementing fusion frames. A fusion frame is a sequence of orthogonal projection operators whose sum can be inverted in a numerically stable way. When properly designed, fusion frames can provide redundant encodings of signals which are optimally robust against certain types of noise and erasures. However, up to this point, few implementable constructions of such frames were known; we show how to construct them using oversampled filter banks. In this work, we first provide polyphase domain characterizations of filter bank fusion frames. We then use these characterizations to construct filter bank fusion frame versions of discrete wavelet and Gabor transforms, emphasizing those specific finite impulse response filters whose frequency responses are well-behaved.
Improvement Cache Efficiency of Explicit Finite Element Procedure and its Application to Parallel Casting Solidification Simulation
Venue: arXiv cs.DC 2010
Year: 2010

A simple method for improving cache efficiency of serial and parallel explicit finite procedure with application to casting solidification simulation over three-dimensional complex geometries is presented. The method is based on division of the global data to smaller blocks and treating each block independently from others at each time step. A novel parallel finite element algorithm for non-overlapped element-base decomposed domain is presented for implementation of serial and parallel version of the presented method. Effect of mesh reordering on the efficiency is also investigated. A simple algorithm is presented for high quality decomposition of decoupled global mesh. Our result shows 10-20 \% performance improvement by mesh reordering and 1.2-2.2 speedup with application of the presented cache efficient algorithm (for serial and parallel versions). Also the presented parallel solver (without cache-efficient feature) shows nearly linear speedup on the traditional Ethernet networked Linux cluster.
Flexible Authentication in Vehicular Ad hoc Networks
Venue: arXiv cs.CR 2010
Year: 2010

A Vehicular Ad-Hoc Network (VANET) is a form of Mobile ad-hoc network, to provide communications among nearby vehicles and between vehicles and nearby fixed roadside equipment. The key operation in VANETs is the broadcast of messages. Consequently, the vehicles need to make sure that the information has been sent by an authentic node in the network. VANETs present unique challenges such as high node mobility, real-time constraints, scalability, gradual deployment and privacy. No existent technique addresses all these requirements. In particular, both inter-vehicle and vehicle-to-roadside wireless communications present different characteristics that should be taken into account when defining node authentication services. That is exactly what is done in this paper, where the features of inter-vehicle and vehicle-to-roadside communications are analyzed to propose differentiated services for node authentication, according to privacy and efficiency needs.
Compressive Sensing over the Grassmann Manifold: a Unified Geometric Framework
Venue: arXiv cs.IT 2010
Year: 2010

$\ell_1$ minimization is often used for finding the sparse solutions of an under-determined linear system. In this paper we focus on finding sharp performance bounds on recovering approximately sparse signals using $\ell_1$ minimization, possibly under noisy measurements. While the restricted isometry property is powerful for the analysis of recovering approximately sparse signals with noisy measurements, the known bounds on the achievable sparsity (The "sparsity" in this paper means the size of the set of nonzero or significant elements in a signal vector.) level can be quite loose. The neighborly polytope analysis which yields sharp bounds for ideally sparse signals cannot be readily generalized to approximately sparse signals. Starting from a necessary and sufficient condition, the "balancedness" property of linear subspaces, for achieving a certain signal recovery accuracy, we give a unified \emph{null space Grassmann angle}-based geometric framework for analyzing the performance of $\ell_1$ minimization. By investigating the "balancedness" property, this unified framework characterizes sharp quantitative tradeoffs between the considered sparsity and the recovery accuracy of the $\ell_{1}$ optimization. As a consequence, this generalizes the neighborly polytope result for ideally sparse signals. Besides the robustness in the "strong" sense for \emph{all} sparse signals, we also discuss the notions of "weak" and "sectional" robustness. Our results concern fundamental properties of linear subspaces and so may be of independent mathematical interest.
Scalable Energy Efficient Location Aware Multicast Protocol for MANET (SEELAMP)
Venue: arXiv cs.NI 2010
Year: 2010

Multicast plays an important role in implementing the group communications in bandwidth scarce multihop mobile ad hoc networks. However, due to the dynamic topology of MANETs it is very difficult to build optimal multicast trees and maintaining group membership, making even more challenging to implement scalable and robust multicast in Mobile Ad hoc Networks (MANET). A scalable and energy efficient location aware multicast algorithm, called SEELAMP, for mobile ad hoc networks is presented in the paper that is based on creation of shared tree using the physical location of the nodes for the multicast sessions. It constructs a shared bi-directional multicast tree for its routing operations rather than a mesh, which helps in achieving more efficient multicast delivery. The algorithm uses the concept of small overlapped zones around each node for proactive topology maintenance with in the zone. Protocol depends on the location information obtained using a distributed location service, which effectively reduces the overheads for route searching and shared multicast tree maintenance. In this paper a new technique of local connectivity management is being proposed that attempts to improve the performance and reliability. It employs a preventive route reconfiguration to avoid the latency in case of link breakages and to prevent the network from splitting.