39013687
On factorization forests of finite height
Simon (Theoret. Comput. Sci. 72 (1990) 65-94) has proved that every morphism from a free semigroup to a finite semigroup S admits a Ramseyan factorization forest of height at most 9|s|. In this paper, we prove the same result of Simon with an improved bound of 7|S|. We provide a simple algorithm for constructing a factorization forest. In addition, we show that the algorithm cannot be improved significantly. We give examples of semigroup morphism such that any Ramseyan factorization forest for the morphism would require a height not less than |S|.
1007735
Structurally Unambiguous Finite Automata
We define a structurally unambiguous finite automaton (SUFA) to be a nondeterministic finite automaton (NFA) with one starting state q0 such that for all input strings w and for any state q, there is at most one path from q0 to q that consumes w. The definition of SUFA differs from the usual definition of an unambiguous finite automaton (UFA) in that the new definition is defined in terms of the transition logic of the finite automaton, and is independent of the choice of final states. We show that SUFA can be exponentially more succinct in the number of states than UFA and MDFA (deterministic finite automata with multiple initial states). Some interesting examples of SUFA are given. We argue that SUFA is a meaningful concept, and can have practical importance as it can implemented efficiently on synchronous models of parallel computation.
14116300
A New Perspective of the Proportional Sampling Strategy
To compare the performance of different testing strategies, P-measure and E-measure are two effectiveness measures used in previous analytical studies. P-measure, which is defined as the probability of detecting at least one failure, is a measure of how likely it is that failure-causing inputs are selected at least once as test cases. E-measure, which is defined as the expected number of failures detected, is a measure of how frequently failure-causing inputs are selected as test cases. However, we have noa priori knowledge of how many failure-causing inputs there are, or where they may lie. In this paper, we study P-measure and E-measure in terms of how much attention an arbitrary input receives. In the context of P-measure, the attention received by an arbitrary input is the probability that the input is selected at least once as a test case, while in the context of E-measure, the attention is the expected number of times that an input is selected as a test case. The attentions received by an input using the proportional sampling strategy and random testing are then compared. The attention received by an input is found to be the same under the two testing strategies for E-measure, whereas for P-measure the attention is always higher for the proportional sampling strategy than for random testing. This new perspective allows us to provide simpler proofs of some known results. Furthermore, we are able to show that the difference in the expected number of distinct test cases considered by the proportional sampling strategy is larger than that of random testing by at most 2k, wherek is the number of partitions and is independent of the number of test cases selected.
17170661
On finite automata with limited nondeterminism
Abstract. We develop a new algorithm for determining if a given nondeterministic finite automaton is limited in nondeterminism. From this, we show that the number of nondeterministic moves of a finite automaton, if limited, is bounded by 
$2^{n} - 2$ where 
$n$ is the number of states. If the finite automaton is over a one-letter alphabet, using Gohon's result the number of nondeterministic moves, if limited, is less than 
$n^{2}$. In both cases, we present families of finite automata demonstrating that the upper bounds obtained are almost tight. We also show that the limitedness problem of the number of nondeterministic moves of finite automata is PSPACE-hard. Since the problem is already known to be in PSPACE, it is therefore PSPACE-complete.

15682339
Measuring nondeterminism in pushdown automata
The amount of nondeterminism that a pushdown automaton requires to recognize an input string can be measured by the minimum number of guesses that it must make to accept the string, where guesses are measured in bits of information. When this quantity is unbounded, the rate at which it grows as the length of the string increases serves as a measure of the pushdown automaton's ''rate of consumption'' of nondeterminism. We show that this measure is similar to other complexity measures in that it gives rise to an infinite hierarchy of complexity classes of context-free languages differing in the amount of the resource (in this case, nondeterminism) that they require. In addition, we show that there are context-free languages that can only be recognized by a pushdown automaton whose nondeterminism grows linearly, resolving an open problem in the literature. In particular, the set of palindromes is such a language.
26148235
On Finite Automata with Limited Nondeterminism
We develop a new algorithm for determining if a given nondeterministic finite automaton is limited in nondeterminism. From this, we show that the number of nondeterministic moves of a finite automaton, if limited, is bounded by 2n−2 where n is the number of states. If the finite automaton is over a one letter alphabet, using Gohon's result the number of nondeterministic moves, if limited, is less than n 2. In both cases, we present families of finite automata demonstrating that the upper bounds obtained are almost tight.
35321520
Reconstructing the Correct Writing Sequence from a Set of Chinese Character Strokes
A Chinese character is composed of several strokes ordered in a particular sequence. The stroke sequence contains useful online information for handwriting recognition and handwriting education. Although there exist some general heuristic stroke sequence rules, sometimes these rules can be inconsistent making it difficult to apply them to determine the standard writing sequence given a set of strokes. In this paper, we proposed a method to estimate the standard writing sequence given the strokes of a Chinese character. The strokes are modeled as discrete states with the state transition costs determined by the result of the classification into forward/backward order of each stroke pair using the positional features. Candidate sequences are found by shortest path algorithm and the final decision of the stroke sequence is made according to the total handwriting energy in case there is more than one candidate sequence. Experiments show that our results provide better performance than existing approaches.
6994949
Ergodic chaotic parameter modulation with application to digital image watermarking
This paper presents a novel technique for image watermarking based on chaos theory. Chaotic parameter modulation (CPM) is employed to modulate the copyright information into the bifurcating parameter of a chaotic system. The system output is a wideband signal and is used as a watermark to be inserted into the host image. In the detection, a novel method based on the ergodic property of chaotic signal is developed to demodulate the embedded copyright information. Compared to previous works on blind watermarking, the proposed technique can effectively remove the interference from the host image and, thus, improve the detection performance dramatically. Simulation results show that the ergodic CPM approach is effective for image watermarking in terms of noise performance, robustness against attacks, and payload. In addition, its implementation is very simple and the computation speed is fast. Compared to holographic transform domain method and the conventional spread spectrum watermarking scheme, the proposed technique is shown to be superior.
35807335
Comments on Program Slicing
This correspondence points out some of the problems with Weiser's algorithm [5] for computing program slices. Corrections are made to Weiser's algorithm. It is shown how Weiser's algorithm can be amended to handle loops. Advantages of the Bergeretti and Carre's approach [1] are discussed.
18854339
Brush Writing Style Classification from Individual Chinese Characters
Chinese calligraphic artwork usually contains a few or even a single character. In order to perform automatic brush writing style classification on these kinds of Chinese calligraphic images, existing approaches need to be modified because they assume that many characters of the same style exist in the input image. A novel approach is proposed to address the brush writing style classification problem for single-character Chinese calligraphic images by combining the texture analysis and the structural information through a set of parameterised ellipses
6040271
Web-Based Handwriting Education with Animated Virtual Teacher
Traditionally, in teaching handwriting, the teacher writes a character on the blackboard, and then students try to follow the teacher in order to write the same character. The teacher can check whether a student’s handwriting is spatially correct by looking at its shape but he/she is not able to verify if the student is writing in the correct stroke order with the correct number of strokes. As a result, we design a web-based handwriting education system. With our proposed system, students can stay at home to do the exercises for learning the handwriting of characters. A student’s handwriting can be captured in digital format with the information in both temporal and spatial domain and the results can be sent to the teacher for evaluation. In addition, we propose to animate a virtual teacher on the student’s terminal for demonstrating the handwriting of the characters to give students a sense of presence.