arXiv subjects

Nicolas Markey

Publications and source records attributed to Nicolas Markey.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

Dependences in Strategy Logic

Strategy Logic (SL) is a very expressive logic for specifying and verifying properties of multi-agent systems: in SL, one can quantify over strategies, assign them to agents, and express properties of the resulting plays. Such a powerful framework has two drawbacks: first, model checking SL has non-elementary complexity; second, the exact semantics of SL is rather intricate, and may not correspond to what is expected. In this paper, we focus on strategy dependences in SL, by tracking how existentially-quantified strategies in a formula may (or may not) depend on other strategies selected in the formula. We study different kinds of dependences, refining the approach of [Mogavero et al., Reasoning about strategies: On the model-checking problem, 2014], and prove that they give rise to different satisfaction relations. In the setting where strategies may only depend on what they have observed, we identify a large fragment of SL for which we prove model checking can be performed in 2EXPTIME.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2017

Courcelle's Theorem Made Dynamic

Dynamic complexity is concerned with updating the output of a problem when the input is slightly changed. We study the dynamic complexity of model checking a fixed monadic second-order formula over evolving subgraphs of a fixed maximal graph having bounded tree-width; here the subgraph evolves by losing or gaining edges (from the maximal graph). We show that this problem is in DynFO (with LOGSPACE precomputation), via a reduction to a Dyck reachability problem on an acyclic automaton.

cs.CC↗

arXiv2017

Bounding Average-energy Games

We consider average-energy games, where the goal is to minimize the long-run average of the accumulated energy. While several results have been obtained on these games recently, decidability of average-energy games with a lower-bound constraint on the energy level (but no upper bound) remained open; in particular, so far there was no known upper bound on the memory that is required for winning strategies. By reducing average-energy games with lower-bounded energy to infinite-state mean-payoff games and analyzing the density of low-energy configurations, we show an almost tight doubly-exponential upper bound on the necessary memory, and that the winner of average-energy games with lower-bounded energy can be determined in doubly-exponential time. We also prove EXPSPACE-hardness of this problem. Finally, we consider multi-dimensional extensions of all types of average-energy games: without bounds, with only a lower bound, and with both a lower and an upper bound on the energy. We show that the fully-bounded version is the only case to remain decidable in multiple dimensions.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2016

Dynamic Complexity of Parity Games with Bounded Tree-Width

Dynamic complexity is concerned with updating the output of a problem when the input is slightly changed. We study the dynamic complexity of two-player parity games over graphs of bounded tree-width, where updates may add or delete edges, or change the owner or color of states. We show that this problem is in DynFO (with LOGSPACE precomputation); this is achieved by a reduction to a Dyck-path problem on an acyclic automaton.

cs.CC↗

arXiv2016

Stochastic Equilibria under Imprecise Deviations in Terminal-Reward Concurrent Games

We study the existence of mixed-strategy equilibria in concurrent games played on graphs. While existence is guaranteed with safety objectives for each player, Nash equilibria need not exist when players are given arbitrary terminal-reward objectives, and their existence is undecidable with qualitative reachability objectives (and only three players). However, these results rely on the fact that the players can enforce infinite plays while trying to improve their payoffs. In this paper, we introduce a relaxed notion of equilibria, where deviations are imprecise. We prove that contrary to Nash equilibria, such (stationary) equilibria always exist, and we develop a PSPACE algorithm to compute one.

cs.GT↗

arXiv2016

Proceedings Cassting Workshop on Games for the Synthesis of Complex Systems and 3rd International Workshop on Synthesis of Complex Parameters

This volume contains the joint proceedings of the Workshop on Games for the Synthesis of Complex Systems (CASSTING'16) and of the 3rd International Workshop on Synthesis of Complex Parameters (SynCoP'16). The workshops were held in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, as satellite events of the 19th European Joint Conferences on Theory and Practice of Software (ETAPS'16). Both workshops are closely related in their topics as well as target audience and they shared a joint invited talk given by Giorgio Delzanno.

cs.SE↗

arXiv2016

Average-energy games (full version)

Two-player quantitative zero-sum games provide a natural framework to synthesize controllers with performance guarantees for reactive systems within an uncontrollable environment. Classical settings include mean-payoff games, where the objective is to optimize the long-run average gain per action, and energy games, where the system has to avoid running out of energy. We study average-energy games, where the goal is to optimize the long-run average of the accumulated energy. We show that this objective arises naturally in several applications, and that it yields interesting connections with previous concepts in the literature. We prove that deciding the winner in such games is in NP $\cap$ coNP and at least as hard as solving mean-payoff games, and we establish that memoryless strategies suffice to win. We also consider the case where the system has to minimize the average-energy while maintaining the accumulated energy within predefined bounds at all times: this corresponds to operating with a finite-capacity storage for energy. We give results for one-player and two-player games, and establish complexity bounds and memory requirements.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2016

Reachability in Networks of Register Protocols under Stochastic Schedulers

We study the almost-sure reachability problem in a distributed system obtained as the asynchronous composition of N copies (called processes) of the same automaton (called protocol), that can communicate via a shared register with finite domain. The automaton has two types of transitions: write-transitions update the value of the register, while read-transitions move to a new state depending on the content of the register. Non-determinism is resolved by a stochastic scheduler. Given a protocol, we focus on almost-sure reachability of a target state by one of the processes. The answer to this problem naturally depends on the number N of processes. However, we prove that our setting has a cut-off property: the answer to the almost-sure reachability problem is constant when N is large enough; we then develop an EXPSPACE algorithm deciding whether this constant answer is positive or negative.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2016

Distributed Synthesis of State-Dependent Switching Control

We present a correct-by-design method of state-dependent control synthesis for linear discrete-time switching systems. Given an objective region R of the state space, the method builds a capture set S and a control which steers any element of S into R. The method works by iterated backward reachability from R. More precisely, S is given as a parametric extension of R, and the maximum value of the parameter is solved by linear programming. The method can also be used to synthesize a stability control which maintains indefinitely within R all the states starting at R. We explain how the synthesis method can be performed in a distributed manner. The method has been implemented and successfully applied to the synthesis of a distributed control of a concrete floor heating system with 11 rooms and 2^11 = 2048 switching modes.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2016

Symbolic Optimal Reachability in Weighted Timed Automata

Weighted timed automata have been defined in the early 2000's for modelling resource-consumption or -allocation problems in real-time systems. Optimal reachability is decidable in weighted timed automata, and a symbolic forward algorithm has been developed to solve that problem. This algorithm uses so-called priced zones, an extension of standard zones with cost functions. In order to ensure termination, the algorithm requires clocks to be bounded. For unpriced timed automata, much work has been done to develop sound abstractions adapted to the forward exploration of timed automata, ensuring termination of the model-checking algorithm without bounding the clocks. In this paper, we take advantage of recent developments on abstractions for timed automata, and propose an algorithm allowing for symbolic analysis of all weighted timed automata, without requiring bounded clocks.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2015

Average-energy games

Two-player quantitative zero-sum games provide a natural framework to synthesize controllers with performance guarantees for reactive systems within an uncontrollable environment. Classical settings include mean-payoff games, where the objective is to optimize the long-run average gain per action, and energy games, where the system has to avoid running out of energy. We study average-energy games, where the goal is to optimize the long-run average of the accumulated energy. We show that this objective arises naturally in several applications, and that it yields interesting connections with previous concepts in the literature. We prove that deciding the winner in such games is in NP inter coNP and at least as hard as solving mean-payoff games, and we establish that memoryless strategies suffice to win. We also consider the case where the system has to minimize the average-energy while maintaining the accumulated energy within predefined bounds at all times: this corresponds to operating with a finite-capacity storage for energy. We give results for one-player and two-player games, and establish complexity bounds and memory requirements.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2015

ATLsc with partial observation

Alternating-time temporal logic with strategy contexts (ATLsc) is a powerful formalism for expressing properties of multi-agent systems: it extends CTL with strategy quantifiers, offering a convenient way of expressing both collaboration and antagonism between several agents. Incomplete observation of the state space is a desirable feature in such a framework, but it quickly leads to undecidable verification problems. In this paper, we prove that uniform incomplete observation (where all players have the same observation) preserves decidability of the model-checking problem, even for very expressive logics such as ATLsc.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2015

Pure Nash Equilibria in Concurrent Deterministic Games

We study pure-strategy Nash equilibria in multi-player concurrent deterministic games, for a variety of preference relations. We provide a novel construction, called the suspect game, which transforms a multi-player concurrent game into a two-player turn-based game which turns Nash equilibria into winning strategies (for some objective that depends on the preference relations of the players in the original game). We use that transformation to design algorithms for computing Nash equilibria in finite games, which in most cases have optimal worst-case complexity, for large classes of preference relations. This includes the purely qualitative framework, where each player has a single omega-regular objective that she wants to satisfy, but also the larger class of semi-quantitative objectives, where each player has several omega-regular objectives equipped with a preorder (for instance, a player may want to satisfy all her objectives, or to maximise the number of objectives that she achieves.)

cs.LO↗

arXiv2014

Quantified CTL: Expressiveness and Complexity

While it was defined long ago, the extension of CTL with quantification over atomic propositions has never been studied extensively. Considering two different semantics (depending whether propositional quantification refers to the Kripke structure or to its unwinding tree), we study its expressiveness (showing in particular that QCTL coincides with Monadic Second-Order Logic for both semantics) and characterise the complexity of its model-checking and satisfiability problems, depending on the number of nested propositional quantifiers (showing that the structure semantics populates the polynomial hierarchy while the tree semantics populates the exponential hierarchy).

cs.LO↗

arXiv2014

Nash Equilibria in Symmetric Games with Partial Observation

We investigate a model for representing large multiplayer games, which satisfy strong symmetry properties. This model is made of multiple copies of an arena; each player plays in his own arena, and can partially observe what the other players do. Therefore, this game has partial information and symmetry constraints, which make the computation of Nash equilibria difficult. We show several undecidability results, and for bounded-memory strategies, we precisely characterize the complexity of computing pure Nash equilibria (for qualitative objectives) in this game model.

cs.GT↗

arXiv2013

Satisfiability of ATL with strategy contexts

Various extensions of the temporal logic ATL have recently been introduced to express rich properties of multi-agent systems. Among these, ATLsc extends ATL with strategy contexts, while Strategy Logic has first-order quantification over strategies. There is a price to pay for the rich expressiveness of these logics: model-checking is non-elementary, and satisfiability is undecidable. We prove in this paper that satisfiability is decidable in several special cases. The most important one is when restricting to turn-based games. We prove that decidability also holds for concurrent games if the number of moves available to the agents is bounded. Finally, we prove that restricting strategy quantification to memoryless strategies brings back undecidability.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2011

Measuring Permissiveness in Parity Games: Mean-Payoff Parity Games Revisited

We study nondeterministic strategies in parity games with the aim of computing a most permissive winning strategy. Following earlier work, we measure permissiveness in terms of the average number/weight of transitions blocked by the strategy. Using a translation into mean-payoff parity games, we prove that the problem of computing (the permissiveness of) a most permissive winning strategy is in NP intersected coNP. Along the way, we provide a new study of mean-payoff parity games. In particular, we prove that the opponent player has a memoryless optimal strategy and give a new algorithm for solving these games.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2008

Model Checking One-clock Priced Timed Automata

We consider the model of priced (a.k.a. weighted) timed automata, an extension of timed automata with cost information on both locations and transitions, and we study various model-checking problems for that model based on extensions of classical temporal logics with cost constraints on modalities. We prove that, under the assumption that the model has only one clock, model-checking this class of models against the logic WCTL, CTL with cost-constrained modalities, is PSPACE-complete (while it has been shown undecidable as soon as the model has three clocks). We also prove that model-checking WMTL, LTL with cost-constrained modalities, is decidable only if there is a single clock in the model and a single stopwatch cost variable (i.e., whose slopes lie in {0,1}).

cs.LO↗