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Anomalies in the wait-free hierarchy

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Book cover Distributed Algorithms (WDAG 1994)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 857))

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Abstract

We consider the hierarchy of wait-free shared objects, and show that this hierarchy does not express the computational power of shared objects. We prove that there are objects that are classified high in the hierarchy, yet, they can not implement objects that are classified much lower in the hierarchy. Our main result is: for any two levels k 1≥k 2 in the hierarchy, there are shared objects X 1 and X 2 that belong to k 1 and k 2, respectively, such that X 1 can not implement X 2. (We allow the specifications of the shared objects to be non deterministic.) This result implies not only that the current definition of the wait-free hierarchy does not express the computational power of shared objects, but also that there is no other hierarchy that does.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Technion, Haifa, Israel

    Ophir Rachman

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  1. Ophir Rachman
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Gerard Tel Paul Vitányi

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© 1994 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Rachman, O. (1994). Anomalies in the wait-free hierarchy. In: Tel, G., Vitányi, P. (eds) Distributed Algorithms. WDAG 1994. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 857. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0020431

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0020431

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-58449-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-48799-9

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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