Searcharxiv⌕ Search
Home/Archive/arXiv

arXiv · 2105.08763

Online bin packing of squares and cubes

Leah Epstein·Loay Mualem
View original source ↗Read source document ↗Export metadata ↓

Abstract

In the d-dimensional online bin packing problem, d-dimensional cubes of positive sizes no larger than 1 are presented one by one to be assigned to positions in d-dimensional unit cube bins. In this work, we provide improved upper bounds on the asymptotic competitive ratio for square and cube bin packing problems, where our bounds do not exceed 2.0885 and 2.5735 for square and cube packing, respectively. To achieve these results, we adapt and improve a previously designed harmonic-type algorithm, and apply a different method for defining weight functions. We detect deficiencies in the state-of-the-art results by providing counter-examples to the current best algorithms and the analysis, where the claimed bounds were 2.1187 for square packing and 2.6161 for cube packing.

Explore related subjects

cs.DScs.DMmath.COmath.OC

Keep this discovery

BibTeXRIS

Leah Epstein, Loay Mualem. 2021-05-18. Online bin packing of squares and cubes. https://arxiv.org/abs/2105.08763

Cite the original work for its findings. Save a collection to share your selection of sources.

KEEP EXPLORING

Related papers

arXiv2026

Quasi-Monte Carlo Beyond Hardy-Krause II: $(1 + \varepsilon)n$ Samples Suffice

Numerical integration studies how well one can estimate the integral of a function $f$ over $[0,1)^d$ using $n$ sample points. The two classical methods, Monte Carlo (MC) and quasi-Monte Carlo (QMC), have complementary strengths and weaknesses, and a fundamental question is to design an approach that combines the benefits of both. Recently, building on the transference principle in discrepancy theory, Bansal and Jiang~\cite{BJ25a} gave a randomized QMC method that bridges MC and QMC guarantees using only i.i.d.\ samples. Their method also goes beyond the classical Koksma--Hlawka inequality: it achieves integration error $\widetilde{O}_d(\sigma_{\mathsf{SO}}(f)/n)$, where the smoothed-out variation $\sigma_{\mathsf{SO}}(f)$ can be substantially smaller than the Hardy--Krause variation that governs the classical bound. However, their algorithm requires $n^2$ i.i.d.\ samples as input, and this quadratic blowup is inherent to any method based on the transference principle. In this work, we bypass the quadratic blowup: for any constant $\varepsilon > 0$, we show that $(1+\varepsilon)n$ i.i.d.\ samples suffice to both obtain the beyond-Hardy--Krause guarantee of~\cite{BJ25a}, resolving an open problem posed there, and to produce low-discrepancy point sequences. Our algorithms are variants of the online Haar-thinning method of Dwivedi, Feldheim, Gurel-Gurevich, and Ramdas~\cite{DFG+19}.

cs.DS↗
arXiv2026

Single-Exponential Algorithms and a Polynomial Kernel for Strong Connectivity Augmentation

Strong Connectivity Augmentation (SCA) asks whether a directed acyclic graph can be made strongly connected by adding at most $k$ prescribed links whose total weight is within a given budget. Klinkby, Misra, and Saurabh (SODA 2021) gave an $O^*(2^{O(k\log k)})$-time algorithm and asked whether the problem admits a single-exponential parameterized algorithm and a polynomial kernel. We answer both questions affirmatively: SCA can be solved in $O^*(9^k)$ time and admits a polynomial kernel with $O(k^4)$ vertices and $O(k^{16})$ bits. For unweighted SCA, we obtain $O^*(4^k)$ time and a kernel with $O(k^3)$ vertices. Our algorithms are based on a particularly simple reduction to Strongly Connected Spanning Subgraph with two edge costs.

cs.DS↗