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On the complexity of or-parallelism

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Abstract

We formalize the implementation mechanisms required to support or-parallel execution of logic programs in terms of operations on dynamic data structures. Upper and lower bounds are derived, in terms of the number of operationsn performed on the data structure, for the problem of guaranteeing correct semantics during or-parallel execution. The lower bound Ω(lgn) formally proves the impossibility of achieving an ideal implementation (i.e., parallel implementation with constant time overhead per operation). We also derive an upper bound of\(\tilde O\left( {\sqrt[3]{n}} \right)\) per operation for or-parallel execution. This upper bound is far better than what has been achieved in the existing or-parallel systems and indicates that faster implementations may be feasible.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory for Logic, Databases and Advanced Programming Department of Computer Science, New Mexico State University, 88003, Las Cruces, NM, USA

    Desh Ranjan, Enrico Pontelli & Gopal Gupta

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  1. Desh Ranjan
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  2. Enrico Pontelli
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  3. Gopal Gupta
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Additional information

Desh Ranjan, Ph.D.: He is currently an Assistant Professor in the department of Computer Science at New Mexico State University where he has been since 1993. His research interests are in theoretical computer science especially algorithms, complexity theory and randomized computation. He received his B. Tech in Computer Science from Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur in India in 1987 and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Computer Science from Cornell University in 1990 and 1992 respectively. He spent 1992–93 as a post-doctoral fellow at the Max-Planck-Institut fur Informatik in Saarbrucken, Germany.

Enrico Pontelli, Ph.D.: He currently works as an Assistant Professor in the dept. of Computer Science of New Mexico State University, where he also serves as Associate Director of the Lab. for Logic, Databases, and Advanced Programming. His interests are in the theoretical and practical aspects of parallel execution of logic and constraint programming languages. He has also performed research on programming with sets and Internet computing. He received his Laurea in Computer Science from the University of Udine in 1991, his M. Sc. in Computer Science from the University of Houston in 1992, and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from New Mexico State University in 1997.

Gopal Gupta, Ph.D.: He is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at New Mexico State University. He co-directs the Laboratory for Logic, Databases and Advanced Programming which he co-founded in 1994. His areas of research interest are Logic Programming, Parallel Computing, Programming Language Semantics, and Software Engineering. He has written/edited 3 books and has authored over 60 research papers. He has served in the program committees of several conferences. He also serves in the editorial board of the Journal of Logic Programming.

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Ranjan, D., Pontelli, E. & Gupta, G. On the complexity of or-parallelism. NGCO 17, 285–307 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03037223

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03037223

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