Abstract: Based on our experience in designing, building and maintaining an information system for supporting a large scale electronic lottery, we present in this paper a unified approach to the design and implementation of electronic lotteries with the focus on pragmatic trust establishment. This approach follows closely the methodologies commonly employed in the development of general information systems. However, central to the proposed approach is the decomposition of a security critical system into layers containing basic trust components so as to facilitate the management of trust, first along the layers, and then as we move from layer to layer. We believe that such a structured approach, based on layers and trust components, can help designers of security critical applications produce demonstrably robust and verifiable systems that people will not hesitate to use.
Abstract: The efficient use of resources and the lossless transfer of data bursts in future optical
networks requires the accurate knowledge of the available bandwidth for each network
link. Such information is important in monitoring congestions and can be used by
appropriate load balancing and congestion avoidance mechanisms. In this paper we
propose a mechanism for monitoring and subsequently managing bandwidth resources,
using the Simple NetworkManagement Protocol (SNMP). In the proposed mechanism,
link bandwidth availability is not a scalar parameter, but a function of time that records
the future utilization of the link. For every output port, each agent-node maintains a
simple data structure in the form of a table that records the utilization profile of that
outgoing link. With the addition of new objects in the Management Information Base
(MIB) of each agent-node and proper synchronization, SNMP can be used to update
and retrieve the reservations made on the links in order to obtain an instant picture of
the network traffic situation.
Abstract: Load balancing/sharing is a policy which exploits the communication facility between the servers of a distributed system, by using the exchanging of status information and jobs between any two servers of the system, in order to improve the performance of the whole system. In this work, we propose a new adaptive distributed hierarchical scheme, the Virtual Tree Algorithm (VTA), which creates a virtual binary tree structure over the actual network topology. It uses the Difference-Initiated (DI) technique ([11, 1]) for load balancing/sharing, which needs remote information for the transfer policy, and no additional information for the location policy. We demonstrate here that the introduced virtual construction can keep the exchanged messages to a number favourable to those of the previously known efficient algorithms. To show the above statement and evaluate the performance of our policy, we make use of both analytical and simulation results. By using the simulation model that we developed, we compared our results with one of the most representative and new adaptive, symmetrical, distributed, and efficient algorithms, the Variable Threshold (V THR) algorithm
Abstract: The efficient use of resources and the lossless transfer of data bursts in future optical
networks requires the accurate knowledge of the available bandwidth for each network
link. Such information is important in monitoring congestions and can be used by
appropriate load balancing and congestion avoidance mechanisms. In this paper we
propose a mechanism for monitoring and subsequently managing bandwidth resources,
using the Simple NetworkManagement Protocol (SNMP). In the proposed mechanism,
link bandwidth availability is not a scalar parameter, but a function of time that records
the future utilization of the link. For every output port, each agent-node maintains a
simple data structure in the form of a table that records the utilization profile of that
outgoing link. With the addition of new objects in the Management Information Base
(MIB) of each agent-node and proper synchronization, SNMP can be used to update
and retrieve the reservations made on the links in order to obtain an instant picture of
the network traffic situation.
Abstract: We describe the design and implementation
of a secure and robust architectural data management
model suitable for cultural environments. Usage and exploitation
of the World Wide Web is a critical requirement
for a series of administrative tasks such as collecting, managing
and distributing valuable cultural and artistic information.
This requirement introduces a great number of
Internet threats for cultural organizations that may cause
huge data and/or financial losses, harm their reputation
and public acceptance as well as people’s trust on them.
Our model addresses a list of fundamental operational
and security requirements. It utilizes a number of cryptographic
primitives and techniques that provide data safety
and secure user interaction on especially demanding online
collaboration environments. We provide a reference
implementation of our architectural model and discuss
the technical issues. It is designed as a standalone solution
but it can be flexibly adapted in broader management
infrastructures.
Abstract: An ever growing emphasis is put nowadays in developing personalized journey planning and renewable mobility services in smart cities. These services combine means of scheduled-based public transport and electric vehicles or bikes, using crowdsourcing techniques for collecting real-time traffic information and for assessing the recommended routes. The goal is to develop an information system that will allow the fast, real-time computation of best routes.
The main challenges in developing such an information system are both technological and algorithmic. The technological challenge concerns the collection, storage, management, and updating of a huge volume of transport data that are usually time-dependent, and the provision (through these data) of personalized renewable mobility services in smartphones. This challenge is typically confronted by creating a cloud infrastructure that on the one hand will support the storage, management, and updating of data, while on the other hand it will handle the necessary data feed to the smartphone applications for providing the users with the requested best routes.
The algorithmic challenge concerns the development of innovative algorithms for the efficient provision of journey planning services in smartphones, based on data they will receive from the cloud infrastructure. These services guarantee the computation of realistic and useful best routes, as well as the updating of the precomputed (route and timetable) information, in case of delays of scheduled public transport vehicles, so that the users can online update their routes to destination. The goal is to develop an algorithmic basis for supporting modern renewable mobility services (information systems), such as "mobility on demand'' (where the next leg of a journey is decided in real-time) and "door-to-door'' personalized mobility, in urban scheduled-based public transport environments. Scheduled-based public transport information systems should not only compute in real-time end-user queries requesting best routes, but also to update the timetable information in case of delays.
The core algorithmic issues of mobility and journey planning (regarding the computation of optimal routes under certain criteria) in scheduled-based public transport systems concern the efficient solution of the fundamental earlier arrival (EA) problem (compute a journey from station S to station T minimizing the overall traveling time required to complete the journey), the minimum number of
transfers (MNT) problem (compute a journey from station S to station T minimizing the number of times a passenger is required to change vehicle), and the efficient updating of timetable information system in case of vehicle delays. The EA and MNT problems have been extensively studied in the literature under two main approaches: the array-based modeling (where the timetable is represented as an array) and the graph-based modeling (where the timetable is represented as a graph). Experimental results have shown so far that the array-based approaches are faster in terms of query time than graph-based ones, as they are able to better exploit data locality and do not rely on priority queues. On the other hand, the array-based approaches have not been theoretically or experimentally studied as far as the efficient updating of timetable information, in case of delays, is concerned.
In this thesis, new graph-based models are being developed that solve efficiently the aforementioned fundamental algorithmic mobility problems in urban scheduled-based public transport information systems, along with a mobile application (journey planner) running on Android-based smartphones that includes a service for the evaluation of the recommended routes by the users. In particular:
(a) An extensive comparative evaluation was conducted on graph-based dynamic models that represent big data volumes regarding their suitability for representing timetable information. The study confirmed that the realistic time-expanded model is the most suitable for representing timetable information.
(b) Two new graph-based models have been developed for representing timetable information (in a timetable information system), the reduced time-expanded model and the dynamic timetable model (DTM), both of which are more space-efficient with respect to the realistic time-expanded model. For both of the new models, new efficient algorithms were developed for fast answering of EA and MNT queries, as well as for updating the timetable information representation in case of delays.
(c)An experimental evaluation was conducted with the new graph-based models and their associated query and update algorithms on a set of 14 real-world scheduled-based transportation systems, including the metropolitan areas of Berlin, Athens, London, Rome, and Madrid. The experimental results showed that the query algorithms of the reduced time-expanded model are superior to those of the DTM model, while the reverse is true regarding the update algorithms. In addition, the experimental study showed that the query algorithms of the new graph-based models compete favorably with those of the best array-based models.
(d) A mobile, cloud-based, journey planner (information system) was developed whose core algorithmic engine builds upon the new graph-based models. The mobile application is accompanied by a service that allows the users to assess the recommended journeys. The journey planner demonstrates the practicality of the new graph-based models and their associated query and update algorithms.
Abstract: Raising awareness among young people and changing their behaviour and habits concerning energy usage is key to achieving sustained energy saving. Additionally, young people are very sensitive to environmental protection so raising awareness among children is much easier than with any other group of citizens. This work examines ways to create an innovative Information & Communication Technologies (ICT) ecosystem (including web-based, mobile, social and sensing elements) tailored specifically for school environments, taking into account both the users (faculty, staff, students, parents) and school buildings, thus motivating and supporting young citizens¢ behavioural change to achieve greater energy efficiency. A mixture of open-source IoT hardware and proprietary platforms on the infrastructure level, are currently being utilized for monitoring a fleet of 18 educational buildings across 3 countries, comprising over 700 IoT monitoring points. Hereon presented is the system¢s high-level architecture, as well as several aspects of its implementation, related to the application domain of educational building monitoring and energy efficiency. The system is developed based on open-source technologies and services in order to make it capable of providing open IT-infrastructure and support from different commercial hardware/sensor vendors as well as open-source solutions. The system presented can be used to develop and offer new app-based solutions that can be used either for educational purposes or for managing the energy efficiency of the building. The system is replicable and adaptable to settings that may be different than the scenarios envisioned here (e.g., targeting different climate zones), different IT infrastructures and can be easily extended to accommodate integration with other systems. The overall performance of the system is evaluated in real-world environment in terms of scalability, responsiveness and simplicity.
Abstract: Consider k particles, 1 red and k–1 white, chasing each other on the nodes of a graph G. If the red one catches one of the white, it ldquoinfectsrdquo it with its color. The newly red particles are now available to infect more white ones. When is it the case that all white will become red? It turns out that this simple question is an instance of information propagation between random walks and has important applications to mobile computing where a set of mobile hosts acts as an intermediary for the spread of information.
In this paper we model this problem by k concurrent random walks, one corresponding to the red particle and k–1 to the white ones. The infection time Tk of infecting all the white particles with red color is then a random variable that depends on k, the initial position of the particles, the number of nodes and edges of the graph, as well as on the structure of the graph.
We easily get that an upper bound on the expected value of Tk is the worst case (over all initial positions) expected meeting time m* of two random walks multiplied by THgr (log k). We demonstrate that this is, indeed, a tight bound; i.e. there is a graph G (a special case of the ldquolollipoprdquo graph), a range of values k
Abstract: An intersection graph of n vertices assumes that each vertex is equipped with a subset of a global label set. Two vertices share an edge
when their label sets intersect. Random Intersection Graphs (RIGs) (as defined in [18, 31]) consider label sets formed by the following experiment:
each vertex, independently and uniformly, examines all the labels (m in total) one by one. Each examination is independent and the vertex
succeeds to put the label in her set with probability p. Such graphs nicely capture interactions in networks due to sharing of resources among nodes.
We study here the problem of efficiently coloring (and of finding upper bounds to the chromatic number) of RIGs. We concentrate in a range
of parameters not examined in the literature, namely: (a) m = n{\'a} for less than 1 (in this range, RIGs differ substantially from the Erd¨os- Renyi random graphs) and (b) the selection probability p is quite high
(e.g. at least ln2 n m in our algorithm) and disallows direct greedy colouring methods.
We manage to get the following results:
For the case mp ln n, for any constant < 1 − , we prove that np colours are enough to colour most of the vertices of the graph with high probability (whp). This means that even for quite dense
graphs, using the same number of colours as those needed to properly colour the clique induced by any label suffices to colour almost all of the vertices of the graph. Note also that this range of values of m, p
is quite wider than the one studied in [4].
� We propose and analyze an algorithm CliqueColour for finding a proper colouring of a random instance of Gn,m,p, for any mp >=ln2 n. The algorithm uses information of the label sets assigned to the
vertices of Gn,m,p and runs in O (n2mp2/ln n) time, which is polynomial in n and m. We also show by a reduction to the uniform random
intersection graphs model that the number of colours required by the algorithm are of the correct order of magnitude with the actual
chromatic number of Gn,m,p.
⋆ This work was partially supported by the ICT Programme of the European Union under contract number ICT-2008-215270 (FRONTS). Also supported by Research Training Group GK-693 of the Paderborn Institute for Scientific Computation
(PaSCo).
� We finally compare the problem of finding a proper colouring for Gn,m,p to that of colouring hypergraphs so that no edge is monochromatic.We show how one can find in polynomial time a k-colouring of the vertices of Gn,m,p, for any integer k, such that no clique induced by only one label in Gn,m,p is monochromatic. Our techniques are novel and try to exploit as much as possible the hidden structure of random intersection graphs in this interesting range.
Abstract: Counting in general, and estimating the cardinality of (multi-) sets in particular, is highly desirable for a large variety of applications, representing a foundational block for the efficient deployment and access of emerging internet-scale information systems. Examples of such applications range from optimizing query access plans in internet-scale databases, to evaluating the significance (rank/score) of various data items in information retrieval applications. The key constraints that any acceptable solution must satisfy are: (i) efficiency: the number of nodes that need be contacted for counting purposes must be small in order to enjoy small latency and bandwidth requirements; (ii) scalability, seemingly contradicting the efficiency goal: arbitrarily large numbers of nodes nay need to add elements to a (multi-) set, which dictates the need for a highly distributed solution, avoiding server-based scalability, bottleneck, and availability problems; (iii) access and storage load balancing: counting and related overhead chores should be distributed fairly to the nodes of the network; (iv) accuracy: tunable, robust (in the presence of dynamics and failures) and highly accurate cardinality estimation; (v) simplicity and ease of integration: special, solution-specific indexing structures should be avoided. In this paper, first we contribute a highly-distributed, scalable, efficient, and accurate (multi-) set cardinality estimator. Subsequently, we show how to use our solution to build and maintain histograms, which have been a basic building block for query optimization for centralized databases, facilitating their porting into the realm of internet-scale data networks.
Abstract: Wireless sensor networks are comprised of a vast number of devices, situated in an area of interest that self organize in a structureless network, in order to monitor/record/measure an environmental variable or phenomenon and subsequently to disseminate the data to the control center.
Here we present research focused on the development, simulation and evaluation of energy efficient algorithms, our basic goal is to minimize the energy consumption. Despite technology advances, the problem of energy use optimization remains valid since current and emerging hardware solutions fail to solve it.
We aim to reduce communication cost, by introducing novel techniques that facilitate the development of new algorithms. We investigated techniques of distributed adaptation of the operations of a protocol by using information available locally on every node, thus through local choices we improve overall performance. We propose techniques for collecting and exploiting limited local knowledge of the network conditions. In an energy efficient manner, we collect additional information which is used to achieve improvements such as forming energy efficient, low latency and fault tolerant paths to route data. We investigate techniques for managing mobility in networks where movement is a characteristic of the control center as well as the sensors. We examine methods for traversing and covering the network field based on probabilistic movement that uses local criteria to favor certain areas.
The algorithms we develop based on these techniques operate a) at low level managing devices, b) on the routing layer and c) network wide, achieving macroscopic behavior through local interactions. The algorithms are applied in network cases that differ in density, node distribution, available energy and also in fundamentally different models, such as under faults, with incremental node deployment and mobile nodes. In all these settings our techniques achieve significant gains, thus distinguishing their value as tools of algorithmic design.
Abstract: A central problem in distributed computing and telecommunications
is the establishment of common knowledge between two computing
entities. An immediate use of such common knowledge is in the
initiation of a secure communication session between two entities
since the two entities may use this common knowledge in order to
produce a secret key for use with some symmetric cipher.
%
The dynamic establishment of shared information (e.g. secret key)
between two entities is particularly important in networks with no
predetermined structure such as wireless mobile ad-hoc networks.
In such networks, nodes establish and terminate communication
sessions dynamically with other nodes which may have never been
encountered before in order to somehow exchange information which
will enable them to subsequently communicate in a secure manner.
%
In this paper we give and theoretically analyze a protocol that
enables two entities initially possessing a string each to
securely eliminate inconsistent bit positions, obtaining strings
with a larger percentage of similarities. This can help the nodes
establish a shared set of bits and use it as a key with some
shared key encryption scheme.
Abstract: Service Oriented Computing and its most famous implementation technology Web Services (WS) are becoming an important enabler of networked business models. Discovery mechanisms are a critical factor to the overall utility of Web Services. So far, discovery mechanisms based on the UDDI standard rely on many centralized and area-specific directories, which poses information stress problems such as performance bottlenecks and fault tolerance. In this context, decentralized approaches based on Peer to Peer overlay networks have been proposed by many researchers as a solution. In this paper, we propose a new structured P2P overlay network infrastructure designed for Web Services Discovery. We present theoretical analysis backed up by experimental results, showing that the proposed solution outperforms popular decentralized infrastructures for web discovery, Chord (and some of its successors), BATON (and it¢s successor) and Skip-Graphs.
Abstract: We study the fundamental problem of computing an arbitrary Nash equilibrium in bimatrix games.
We start by proposing a novel characterization of the set of Nash equilibria, via a bijective map to the solution set of a (parameterized) quadratic program, whose feasible space is the (highly structured) set of correlated equilibria.
We then proceed by proposing new subclasses of bimatrix games for which either an exact polynomial-time construction, or at least a FPTAS, is possible. In particular, we introduce the notion of mutual (quasi-) concavity of a bimatrix game, which assures (quasi-) convexity of our quadratic program, for at least one value of the parameter. For mutually concave bimatrix games, we provide a polynomial-time computation of a Nash equilibrium, based on the polynomial tractability of convex quadratic programming. For the mutually quasiconcave games, we provide (to our knowledge) the first FPTAS for the construction of a Nash equilibrium.
Of course, for these new polynomially tractable subclasses of bimatrix games to be useful, polynomial-time certificates are also necessary that will allow us to efficiently identify them. Towards this direction, we provide various characterizations of mutual concavity, which allow us to construct such a certificate. Interestingly, these characterizations also shed light to some structural properties of the bimatrix games satisfying mutual concavity. This subclass entirely contains the most popular subclass of polynomial-time solvable bimatrix games, namely, all the constant-sum games (rank-0 games). It is though incomparable to the subclass of games with fixed rank [KT07]: Even rank-1 games may not be mutually concave (eg, Prisoner's dilemma), but on the other hand, there exist mutually concave games of arbitrary (even full) rank. Finally, we prove closeness of mutual concavity under (Nash equilibrium preserving) positive affine transformations of bimatrix games having the same scaling factor for both payoff matrices. For different scaling factors the property is not necessarily preserved.
Abstract: A fundamental approach in finding efficiently best routes or optimal itineraries in traffic information
systems is to reduce the search space (part of graph visited) of the most commonly used
shortest path routine (Dijkstra¢s algorithm) on a suitably defined graph. We investigate reduction
of the search space while simultaneously retaining data structures, created during a preprocessing
phase, of size linear (i.e., optimal) to the size of the graph. We show that the search space of
Dijkstra¢s algorithm can be significantly reduced by extracting geometric information from a given
layout of the graph and by encapsulating precomputed shortest-path information in resulted geometric
objects (containers). We present an extensive experimental study comparing the impact of
different types of geometric containers using test data from real-world traffic networks. We also
present new algorithms as well as an empirical study for the dynamic case of this problem, where
edge weights are subject to change and the geometric containers have to be updated and show that
our new methods are two to three times faster than recomputing everything from scratch. Finally,
in an appendix, we discuss the software framework that we developed to realize the implementations
of all of our variants of Dijkstra¢s algorithm. Such a framework is not trivial to achieve as our
goal was to maintain a common code base that is, at the same time, small, efficient, and flexible,
as we wanted to enhance and combine several variants in any possible way.
Abstract: In this paper we examine the problem of searching for some information item in the nodes of a fully
interconnected computer network, where each node contains information relevant to some topic
as well as links to other network nodes that also contain information, not necessarily related to
locally kept information. These links are used to facilitate the Internet users and mobile software
agents that try to locate specific pieces of information. However, the links do not necessarily point
to nodes containing information of interest to the user or relevant to the aims of the mobile agent.
Thus an element of uncertainty is introduced. For example, when an Internet user or some search
agent lands on a particular network node, they see a set of links that point to information that is,
supposedly, relevant to the current search. Therefore, we can assume that a link points to relevant
information with some unknown probability p that, in general, is related to the number of nodes
in the network (intuitively, as the network grows, this probability tends to zero since adding more
nodes to the network renders some extant links less accurate or obsolete). Consequently, since there
is uncertainty as to whether the links contained in a node?s Web page are correct or not, a search
algorithm cannot rely on following the links systematically since it may end up spending too much
time visiting nodes that contain irrelevant information. In this work, we will describe and analyze
a search algorithm that is only allowed to transfer a fixed amount of memory along communication
links as it visits the network nodes. The algorithm is, however, allowed to use one bit of memory at
each node as an ?already visited? flag. In this way the algorithm has its memory distributed to the
network nodes, avoiding overloading the network links as it moves from node to node searching for
the information. We work on fully interconnected networks for simplicity reasons and, moreover,
because according to some recent experimental evidence, such networks can be considered to be a
good approximation of the current structure of the World Wide Web.
Abstract: The adoption of technologies like the IoT in urban environments, together with the intensive use of smartphones, is driving transformation towards smart cities. Under this perspective, Experimentation-as-a-Service within OrganiCity aims to create an experimental facility with technologies, services, and applications that simplify innovation within urban ecosystems. We discuss here tools that facilitate experimentation, implementing ways to organize, execute, and administer experimentation campaigns in a smart city context. We discuss the benefits of our framework, presenting some preliminary results. This is the first time such tools are paired with large-scale smart city infrastructures, enabling both city-scale experimentation and cross-site experimentation.
Abstract: The promises inherent in users coming together to form data
sharing network communities, bring to the foreground new problems formulated
over such dynamic, ever growing, computing, storage, and networking
infrastructures. A key open challenge is to harness these highly
distributed resources toward the development of an ultra scalable, efficient
search engine. From a technical viewpoint, any acceptable solution
must fully exploit all available resources dictating the removal of any
centralized points of control, which can also readily lead to performance
bottlenecks and reliability/availability problems. Equally importantly,
however, a highly distributed solution can also facilitate pluralism in informing
users about internet content, which is crucial in order to preclude
the formation of information-resource monopolies and the biased visibility
of content from economically-powerful sources. To meet these challenges,
the work described here puts forward MINERVA{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½, a novel search
engine architecture, designed for scalability and efficiency. MINERVA{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½
encompasses a suite of novel algorithms, including algorithms for creating
data networks of interest, placing data on network nodes, load balancing,
top-k algorithms for retrieving data at query time, and replication algorithms
for expediting top-k query processing. We have implemented the
proposed architecture and we report on our extensive experiments with
real-world, web-crawled, and synthetic data and queries, showcasing the
scalability and efficiency traits of MINERVA{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½.
Abstract: Consider an information network with harmful procedures called attackers (e.g., viruses); each attacker uses a probability distribution to choose a node of the network to damage. Opponent to the attackers is the system protector scanning and cleaning from attackers some part of the network (e.g., an edge or a path), which it chooses independently using another probability distribution. Each attacker wishes to maximize the probability of escaping its cleaning by the system protector; towards a conflicting objective, the system protector aims at maximizing the expected number of cleaned attackers.
We model this network scenario as a non-cooperative strategic game on graphs. We focus on the special case where the protector chooses a single edge. We are interested in the associated Nash equilibria, where no network entity can unilaterally improve its local objective. We obtain the following results:
{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½ No instance of the game possesses a pure Nash equilibrium.
{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½Every mixed Nash equilibrium enjoys a graph-theoretic structure, which enables a (typically exponential) algorithm to compute it.
{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½ We coin a natural subclass of mixed Nash equilibria, which we call matching Nash equilibria, for this game on graphs. Matching Nash equilibria are defined using structural parameters of graphs, such as independent sets and matchings.
{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½We derive a characterization of graphs possessing matching Nash equilibria. The characterization enables a linear time algorithm to compute a matching Nash equilibrium on any such graph with a given independent set and vertex cover.
{\^a}{\"i}¿½{\"i}¿½ Bipartite graphs are shown to satisfy the characterization. So, using a polynomial-time algorithm to compute a perfect matching in a bipartite graph, we obtain, as our main result, an efficient graph-theoretic algorithm to compute a matching Nash equilibrium on any instance of the game with a bipartite graph.
Abstract: Web services are becoming an important enabler of the Semantic Web. Besides the need for a rich description mechanism, Web Service information should be made available in an accessible way for machine processing. In this paper, we propose a new P2P basedapproach for Web Services discovery. Peers that store Web Services information, such as data item descriptions, are efficiently located using a scalable and robust data indexing structure for Peer-to-Peer data networks, NIPPERS. We present a theoretical analysis which shows that the communication cost of the query and update operations scale double-logarithmically with the number of NIPPERS nodes. Furthermore, we show that the network is robust with respect to failures fulfilling quality of web services requirements.
Abstract: We study the fundamental problem 2NASH of computing a Nash equilibrium (NE) point in bimatrix games. We start by proposing a novel characterization of the NE set, via a bijective map to the solution set of a parameterized quadratic program (NEQP), whose feasible space is the highly structured set of correlated equilibria (CE). This is, to our knowledge, the first characterization of the subset of CE points that are in “1–1” correspondence with the NE set of the game, and contributes to the quite lively discussion on the relation between the spaces of CE and NE points in a bimatrix game (e.g., [15], [26] and [33]).
We proceed with studying a property of bimatrix games, which we call mutually concavity (MC), that assures polynomial-time tractability of 2NASH, due to the convexity of a proper parameterized quadratic program (either NEQP, or a parameterized variant of the Mangasarian & Stone formulation [23]) for a particular value of the parameter. We prove various characterizations of the MC-games, which eventually lead us to the conclusion that this class is equivalent to the class of strategically zero-sum (SZS) games of Moulin & Vial [25]. This gives an alternative explanation of the polynomial-time tractability of 2NASH for these games, not depending on the solvability of zero-sum games. Moreover, the recognition of the MC-property for an arbitrary game is much faster than the recognition SZS-property. This, along with the comparable time-complexity of linear programs and convex quadratic programs, leads us to a much faster algorithm for 2NASH in MC-games.
We conclude our discussion with a comparison of MC-games (or, SZS-games) to kk-rank games, which are known to admit for 2NASH a FPTAS when kk is fixed [18], and a polynomial-time algorithm for k=1k=1 [2]. We finally explore some closeness properties under well-known NE set preserving transformations of bimatrix games.
Abstract: In sponsored search auctions, advertisers compete for a number
of available advertisement slots of different quality. The
auctioneer decides the allocation of advertisers to slots using
bids provided by them. Since the advertisers may act
strategically and submit their bids in order to maximize their
individual objectives, such an auction naturally defines a
strategic game among the advertisers. In order to quantify
the efficiency of outcomes in generalized second price auctions,
we study the corresponding games and present new
bounds on their price of anarchy, improving the recent results
of Paes Leme and Tardos [16] and Lucier and Paes
Leme [13]. For the full information setting, we prove a surprisingly
low upper bound of 1.282 on the price of anarchy
over pure Nash equilibria. Given the existing lower bounds,
this bound denotes that the number of advertisers has almost
no impact on the price of anarchy. The proof exploits
the equilibrium conditions developed in [16] and follows by
a detailed reasoning about the structure of equilibria and a
novel relation of the price of anarchy to the objective value
of a compact mathematical program. For more general equilibrium
classes (i.e., mixed Nash, correlated, and coarse correlated
equilibria), we present an upper bound of 2.310 on
the price of anarchy. We also consider the setting where
advertisers have incomplete information about their competitors
and prove a price of anarchy upper bound of 3.037
over Bayes-Nash equilibria. In order to obtain the last two
bounds, we adapt techniques of Lucier and Paes Leme [13]
and significantly extend them with new arguments
Abstract: In many cryptographic applications it is necessary to generate
elliptic curves (ECs) with certain security properties. These curves
are commonly constructed using the Complex Multiplication method
which typically uses the roots of Hilbert or Weber polynomials. The former
generate the EC directly, but have high computational demands,
while the latter are faster to construct but they do not lead, directly, to
the desired EC. In this paper we present in a simple and unifying manner
a complete set of transformations of the roots of a Weber polynomial to
the roots of its corresponding Hilbert polynomial for all discriminant values
on which they are defined. Moreover, we prove a theoretical estimate
of the precision required for the computation of Weber polynomials. Finally,
we experimentally assess the computational efficiency of theWeber
polynomials along with their precision requirements for various discriminant
values and compare the results with the theoretical estimates. Our
experimental results may be used as a guide for the selection of the most
efficient curves in applications residing in resource limited devices such as
smart cards that support secure and efficient Public Key Infrastructure
(PKI) services.
Abstract: In this work we propose and develop a comprehensive
infrastructure, coined PastryStrings, for supporting rich
queries on both numerical (with range, and comparison
predicates) and string attributes, (accommodating equality,
prefix, suffix, and containment predicates) over DHT networks
utilising prefix-based routing. As event-based, publish/
subscribe information systems are a champion application
class, we formulate our solution in terms of this environment.
Abstract: In this work we propose and develop a comprehensive infrastructure, coined PastryStrings, for supporting rich queries on
both numerical (with range, and comparison predicates) and string attributes, (accommodating equality, prefix, suffix, and
containment predicates) over DHT networks utilising prefix-based routing. As event-based, publish/subscribe information
systems are a champion application class, we formulate our solution in terms of this environment.
Abstract: We generalize Cuckoo Hashing [16] to d-ary Cuckoo Hashing and show how this yields a simple hash table data structure that stores n elements in (1 + ∈) n memory cells, for any constant ∈ > 0. Assuming uniform hashing, accessing or deleting table entries takes at most d = O(ln 1/∈ ) probes and the expected amortized insertion time is constant. This is the first dictionary that has worst case constant access time and expected constant update time, works with (1+∈) n space, and supports satellite information. Experiments indicate that d = 4 choices suffice for ∈ ≈ 0.03. We also describe a hash table data structure using explicit constant time hash functions, using at most d = O(ln2 1/∈ ) probes in the worst case.
A corollary is an expected linear time algorithm for finding maximum cardinality matchings in a rather natural model of sparse random bipartite graphs.
This work was partially supported by DFG grant SA 933/1-1 and the Future and Emerging Technologies programme of the EU under contract number IST-1999- 14186 (ALCOM-FT).
The present work was initiated while this author was at BRICS, Aarhus University, Denmark.
Part of this work was done while the author was at MPII. 1 In this paper “whp.” will mean “with probability 1 - O(1/n)”.
Abstract: We generalize Cuckoo Hashing [16] to d-ary Cuckoo Hashing and show how this yields a simple hash table data structure that stores n elements in (1 + ∈) n memory cells, for any constant ∈ > 0. Assuming uniform hashing, accessing or deleting table entries takes at most d = O(ln 1/∈ ) probes and the expected amortized insertion time is constant. This is the first dictionary that has worst case constant access time and expected constant update time, works with (1+∈) n space, and supports satellite information. Experiments indicate that d = 4 choices suffice for ∈ ≈ 0.03. We also describe a hash table data structure using explicit constant time hash functions, using at most d = O(ln2 1/∈ ) probes in the worst case.
A corollary is an expected linear time algorithm for finding maximum cardinality matchings in a rather natural model of sparse random bipartite graphs.
This work was partially supported by DFG grant SA 933/1-1 and the Future and Emerging Technologies programme of the EU under contract number IST-1999- 14186 (ALCOM-FT).
The present work was initiated while this author was at BRICS, Aarhus University, Denmark.
Part of this work was done while the author was at MPII. 1 In this paper “whp.” will mean “with probability 1 - O(1/n)”.
Abstract: Efficient query processing in traditional database
management systems relies on statistics on base data. For centralized systems, there is a rich body of research results on such statistics, from simple aggregates to more elaborate synopses such as sketches and histograms. For Internet-scale distributed systems, on the other hand, statisticsmanagement still poses major challenges. With the work in this paper we aim to endow peer-to-peer data management over structured
overlays with the power associated with such statistical information, with emphasis on meeting the scalability challenge.
To this end, we first contribute efficient, accurate, and decentralized algorithms that can compute key aggregates such as Count, CountDistinct, Sum, and Average. We show how to construct several types of histograms, such as simple Equi-Width, Average Shifted Equi-Width, and Equi-Depth histograms. We present a full-fledged open-source implementation
of these tools for distributed statistical synopses,
and report on a comprehensive experimental performance evaluation, evaluating our contributions in terms of efficiency, accuracy, and scalability.
Abstract: A key issue when designing and implementing large-scale publish/subscribe systems is how to efficiently propagate subscriptions among the brokers of the system. Brokers require this information in order to forward incoming events only to interested users, filtering out unrelated events, which can save significant overheads (particularly network bandwidth and processing time at the brokers). In this paper we contribute the notion of subscription summaries, a mechanism appropriately compacting subscription information. We develop the associated data structures and matching algorithms. The proposed mechanism can handle event/subscription schemata that are rich in terms of their attribute types and powerful in terms of the allowed operations on them. Our major results are that the proposed mechanism (i) is scalable, with the bandwidth required to propagate subscriptions increasing only slightly, even at huge-scales, and (ii) is significantly more efficient, up to orders of magnitude, depending on the scale, with respect to the bandwidth requirements for propagating subscriptions.
Abstract: Content integration of web data sources is becoming increasingly
important for the next generation information
systems. However, all proposed solutions are faced with
the same performance bottleneck: the network overhead
incurred when contacting the integrated e-sites. With this
demo paper we shall demonstrate the functionality of HyperHotel.
HyperHotel is used for finding appropriate hotel
rooms when travelling. Its novetlies are that it is designed
and implemented as an internet web-hotel content integration
application and that it is built on top of D.I.C.E. and
Co.In.S.; a novel content integration infrastructure consisting
of a domain-independent COntent INtegration System
and its Data Integration Cache Engine. We¢ll show how the
infrastructure of D.I.C.E. and Co.In.S. can be applied and
exploited in HyperHotel in order to improve the response
time of complex user queries. This exemplifies the significance
of this infrastructure since HyperHotel is representative
of a large class of e-commerce, content integration
applications.
Abstract: Consider k particles, 1 red and k-1 white, chasing each other on the nodes of a graph G. If the red one catches one of the white, it “infects” it with its color. The newly red particles are now available to infect more white ones. When is it the case that all white will become red? It turns out that this simple question is an instance of information propagation between random walks and has important applications to mobile computing where a set of mobile hosts acts as an intermediary for the spread of information.
In this paper we model this problem by k concurrent random walks, one corresponding to the red particle and k-1 to the white ones. The infection time Tk of infecting all the white particles with red color is then a random variable that depends on k, the initial position of the particles, the number of nodes and edges of the graph, as well as on the structure of the graph.
In this work we develop a set of probabilistic tools that we use to obtain upper bounds on the (worst case w.r.t. initial positions of particles) expected value of Tk for general graphs and important special cases. We easily get that an upper bound on the expected value of Tk is the worst case (over all initial positions) expected meeting time m* of two random walks multiplied by . We demonstrate that this is, indeed, a tight bound; i.e. there is a graph G (a special case of the “lollipop” graph), a range of values k
Abstract: Unattended surveillance of public transportation infrastructures that may generate alarms in the case of a destructive event, and provide information on the current status of the infrastructure as well as on the short interval before the event, can empower the Search and Rescue teams with useful information that may save lives increasing their overall effectiveness. This paper presents a novel system that aims at providing a scalable, unattended surveillance system with networked embedded systems, cameras and sensors for public transportations sector.