Polynomial anonymous dynamic distributed computing without a unique leader

Dariusz R. Kowalski, Miguel A. Mosteiro

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

Counting the number of nodes in Anonymous Dynamic Networks is enticing from an algorithmic perspective: an important computation in a restricted platform with promising applications. Starting with Michail, Chatzigiannakis, and Spirakis [1], a flurry of papers sped up the running time guarantees from doubly-exponential to polynomial [2,3]. There is a common theme across all those works: a distinguished node is assumed to be present, because Counting cannot be solved deterministically without at least one. In the present work we study challenging questions that naturally follow: how to efficiently count with more than one distinguished node, or how to count without any distinguished node. More importantly, what is the minimal information needed about these distinguished nodes and what is the best we can aim for (count precision, stochastic guarantees, etc.) without any. We present negative and positive results to answer these questions. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work that addresses them.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)37-63
Number of pages27
JournalJournal of Computer and System Sciences
Volume123
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 2022

Keywords

  • Anonymous dynamic networks
  • Counting
  • Distributed algorithms

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Theoretical Computer Science
  • Computer Networks and Communications
  • Computational Theory and Mathematics
  • Applied Mathematics

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