0000000000413397

AUTHOR

Ferdinando Cicalese

ALGORITHMS FOR JUMBLED PATTERN MATCHING IN STRINGS

The Parikh vector p(s) of a string s is defined as the vector of multiplicities of the characters. Parikh vector q occurs in s if s has a substring t with p(t)=q. We present two novel algorithms for searching for a query q in a text s. One solves the decision problem over a binary text in constant time, using a linear size index of the text. The second algorithm, for a general finite alphabet, finds all occurrences of a given Parikh vector q and has sub-linear expected time complexity; we present two variants, which both use a linear size index of the text.

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On Table Arrangements, Scrabble Freaks, and Jumbled Pattern Matching

Given a string s, the Parikh vector of s, denoted p(s), counts the multiplicity of each character in s. Searching for a match of Parikh vector q (a “jumbled string”) in the text s requires to find a substring t of s with p(t) = q. The corresponding decision problem is to verify whether at least one such match exists. So, for example for the alphabet Σ = {a, b, c}, the string s = abaccbabaaa has Parikh vector p(s) = (6,3,2), and the Parikh vector q = (2,1,1) appears once in s in position (1,4). Like its more precise counterpart, the renown Exact String Matching, Jumbled Pattern Matching has ubiquitous applications, e.g., string matching with a dyslectic word processor, table rearrangements, …

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On Approximate Jumbled Pattern Matching in Strings

Given a string s, the Parikh vector of s, denoted p(s), counts the multiplicity of each character in s. Searching for a match of a Parikh vector q in the text s requires finding a substring t of s with p(t) = q. This can be viewed as the task of finding a jumbled (permuted) version of a query pattern, hence the term Jumbled Pattern Matching. We present several algorithms for the approximate version of the problem: Given a string s and two Parikh vectors u, v (the query bounds), find all maximal occurrences in s of some Parikh vector q such that u <= q <= v. This definition encompasses several natural versions of approximate Parikh vector search. We present an algorithm solving this problem …

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