We have improved an algorithm generating synchronizing automata with a large length of the shortest reset words. This has been done by refining some known results concerning bounds on the reset length. Our improvements make possible to consider a number of conjectures and open questions concerning synchronizing automata, checking them for automata with a small number of states and discussing the results. In particular, we have verified the Černý conjecture for all binary automata with at most 12 states, and all ternary automata with at most 8 states.
Most slowly synchronizing automata over binary alphabets are circular, i.e., containing a letter permuting the states in a single cycle, and their set of synchronizing words has maximal state complexity, which also implies complete reachability.Here, we take a closer look at generalized circular and completely reachable automata. We derive that over a binary alphabet every completely reachable automaton must be circular, a consequence of a structural result stating that completely reachable automata over strictly less letters than states always contain permutational letters. We state sufficien…
A word w is called a synchronizing (recurrent, reset) word of a deterministic finite automaton (DFA) if w brings all states of the automaton to some state; a DFA that has a synchronizing word is said to be synchronizing. Cerny conjectured in 1964 that every n-state synchronizing DFA possesses a synchronizing word of length at most (n -1)2. We consider automaton with aperiodic transition monoid (such automaton is called aperiodic). We show that every synchronizing n-state aperiodic automaton has a synchronizing word of length at most n(n-2)+1. Thus, for aperiodic automaton as well as for automa…
In this paper we are dealing with the issue of finding possibly short synchronizing words in automata with weight assigned to each letter in the alphabet $Σ$. First we discuss some complexity problems, and then we present new approximation algorithm in four variations.
We give a new characterization of primitive permutation groups tied to the notion of completely reachable automata. Also, we introduce sync-maximal permutation groups tied to the state complexity of the set of synchronizing words of certain associated automata and show that they are contained between the $2$-homogeneous and the primitive groups. Lastly, we define $k$-reachable groups in analogy with synchronizing groups and motivated by our characterization of primitive permutation groups. But the results show that a $k$-reachable permutation group of degree $n$ with $6 \le k \le n - 6$ is eit…
The question if a deterministic finite automaton admits a software reset in the form of a so-called synchronizing word can be answered in polynomial time. In this paper, we extend this algorithmic question to deterministic automata beyond finite automata. We prove that the question of synchronizability becomes undecidable even when looking at deterministic one-counter automata. This is also true for another classical mild extension of regularity, namely that of deterministic one-turn push-down automata. However, when we combine both restrictions, we arrive at scenarios with a PSPACE-complete (…
Fast matching of regular expressions with bounded repetition, aka counting, such as (ab){50,100}, i.e., matching linear in the length of the text and independent of the repetition bounds, has been an open problem for at least two decades. We show that, for a wide class of regular expressions with counting, which we call synchronizing, fast matching is possible. We empirically show that the class covers nearly all counting used in usual applications of regex matching. This complexity result is based on an improvement and analysis of a recent matching algorithm that compiles regexes to determini…
We generalize the concept of synchronizing words for finite automata, which map all states of the automata to the same state, to deterministic visibly push-down automata. Here, a synchronizing word w does not only map all states to the same state but also fulfills some conditions on the stack content of each run after reading w. We consider three types of these stack constraints: after reading w, the stack (1) is empty in each run, (2) contains the same sequence of stack symbols in each run, or (3) contains an arbitrary sequence which is independent of the other runs. We show that in contrast …