
arXiv: cs/9902005
We introduce a search problem called “mutual search” where k agents, arbitrarily distributed over n sites, are required to locate one another by posing queries of the form “Anybody at site i ?”. We ask for the least number of queries that is necessary and sufficient. For the case of two agents using deterministic protocols, we obtain the following worst-case results: In an oblivious setting (where all pre-planned queries are executed), there is no savings: n -1 queries are required and are sufficient. In a nonoblivious setting, we can exploit the paradigm of “no news is also news” to obtain significant savings: in the synchronous case 0.586 n queries are required; in the asynchronous case 0.896 n queries suffice and a fortiori 0.536 n queries are required; for o(√n) agents using a synchronous deterministic protocol less than n queries suffice; there is a simple randomized protocol for two agents with worst-case expected 0.5 n queries and all radomized protocols require at least 0.25 n worst-case expected queries. The graph-theoretic framework we formulate for expressing and analyzing algorithms for this problem may be of independent interest.
FOS: Computer and information sciences, Discrete Mathematics (cs.DM), Databases (cs.DB), Computational Complexity (cs.CC), F.2,C.2,E,1,D.4.4, Computer Science - Information Retrieval, Computer Science - Computational Complexity, Computer Science - Databases, Computer Science - Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing, Computer Science - Data Structures and Algorithms, Data Structures and Algorithms (cs.DS), Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing (cs.DC), Problem solving in the context of artificial intelligence (heuristics, search strategies, etc.), Information Retrieval (cs.IR), Computer Science - Discrete Mathematics
FOS: Computer and information sciences, Discrete Mathematics (cs.DM), Databases (cs.DB), Computational Complexity (cs.CC), F.2,C.2,E,1,D.4.4, Computer Science - Information Retrieval, Computer Science - Computational Complexity, Computer Science - Databases, Computer Science - Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing, Computer Science - Data Structures and Algorithms, Data Structures and Algorithms (cs.DS), Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing (cs.DC), Problem solving in the context of artificial intelligence (heuristics, search strategies, etc.), Information Retrieval (cs.IR), Computer Science - Discrete Mathematics
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