Abstract
Consider a distributed system consisting of N independent communicating agents. Periodically, agents synchronize and exchange information, both about each other and about agents they have talked to earlier. As a result, an agent a t may receive indirect information about another agent a j which is more recent than the information exchanged in the last direct synchronization between a i and a j . The problem is to ensure that agents always come away from a synchronization with the latest possible information about all other agents. This requires that when a i and a j meet, they should decide which of them has more recent information about any other agent a k . We propose an algorithm to solve this problem which is finite-state and local. Formally, this means our algorithm can be implemented by an asynchronous automaton.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
R. Cori, E. Sopena: Some combinatorial aspects of time-stamp systems, Europ. J. Combinatorics, 14 (1993) 95–102.
V. Diekert, A. Muscholl: Deterministic asynchronous automata for infinite traces, Proc. STACS '93, LNCS 665 (1993) 617–628.
D. Dolev, N. Shavit: Bounded concurrent time-stamps are constructible, Proc. ACM STOC (1989) 454–466.
P. Gastin, A. Petit: Asynchronous cellular automata for infinite traces, Proc. ICALP '92, LNCS 623 (1992) 583–594.
P. Godefroid, P. Wolper: A partial order approach to model checking, Proc. 6th IEEE LICS, Amsterdam (1991) 406–415.
A. Israeli, M. Li: Bounded time-stamps, Proc. 28th IEEE FOCS (1987) 371–382.
A. Mazurkiewicz: Basic notions of trace theory, in: J.W. de Bakker, W.-P. de Roever, G. Rozenberg (eds.), Linear time, branching time and partial order in logics and models for concurrency, LNCS 354, (1989) 285–363.
M. Mukund, M. Sohoni: Keeping track of the latest gossip: Bounded timestamps suffice, Report TCS-93-3, School of Mathematics, SPIC Science Foundation, Madras, India (1993).
P.S. Thiagarajan: A trace based extension of PTL, Report TCS-93-4, School of Mathematics, SPIC Science Foundation, Madras, India (1993).
W. Zielonka: Notes on finite asynchronous automata, R.A.I.R.O.—Inf. Théor. et Appl., 21 (1987) 99–135.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1993 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Mukund, M., Sohoni, M. (1993). Keeping track of the latest gossip: Bounded time-stamps suffice. In: Shyamasundar, R.K. (eds) Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science. FSTTCS 1993. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 761. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-57529-4_71
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-57529-4_71
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-57529-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-48211-6
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive