Modern Graph Theory

Stephen J. Hartley Oxford University Press, New York, 1998, 260 pp. ISBN 0-19-511315-2, $45.00 Concurrent Programming  is a thorough treatment of Java multi-threaded programming for both a stand-alone and distributed environment. Designed mostly for students in concurrent or parallel programming classes, the text is also an excellent reference for the practicing professional developing multi-threaded programs or applets. Hartley first provides a complete explanation of the features of Java necessary to write concurrent programs, including topics such as exception handling, interfaces, and packages. He then gives the reader a solid background to write multi-threaded programs and also presents the problems introduced when writing concurrent programs—namely race conditions, mutual exclusion, and deadlock. Hartley also provides several software solutions that do not require the use of common process and thread mechanisms. Once the groundwork is laid for writing concurrent programs, Hartley then takes a different approach than most Java references. Rather than presenting how Java handles mutual exclusion with the  synchronized  keyword (although it is covered later), he first looks at semaphore-based solutions to classic concurrent problems such as bounded-buffer, readers-writers, and the dining philosophers. Hartley also uses the same approach to develop Java classes for monitors and message passing. This unique approach to introducing concurrency allows the readers to both understand how Java threads are synchronized and how the basic synchronization mechanism can be used to construct more abstract tools such as semaphores. If there is a shortcoming with the text it is with the lack of sufficient coverage of remote method invocation (RMI), although there is a section covering RMI. This is quite understandable as RMI is a fairly recent phenomenon with the Java community. Also, the classes that Hartley provides could easily implement RMI rather than sockets to handle communication. The strengths of the book include its ease in reading, several examples at the end of chapters, a package similar to Xtango that provides algorithm animation, and a supportive web site by the author (see  www.mcs.drexel.edu/~shartley/ConcProgJava/index.html ) including compressed source code. As Java becomes more dominant on the server side of multi-tier applications, writing thread-safe concurrent applications becomes even more important.  Concurrent Programming  is a strong step towards teaching students and professionals such skills. Greg Gagne, Westminster College of Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, Utah

Distributed Computing: Fundamentals, Simulations and Advanced Topics

Control of Discrete-event Systems provides a survey of the most important topics in the discrete-event systems theory with particular focus on finite-state automata, Petri nets and max-plus algebra. Coverage ranges from introductory material on the basic notions and definitions of discrete-event systems to more recent results. Special attention is given to results on supervisory control, state estimation and fault diagnosis of both centralized and distributed/decentralized systems developed in the framework of the Distributed Supervisory Control of Large Plants (DISC) project. Later parts of the text are devoted to the study of congested systems though fluidization, an over approximation allowing a much more efficient study of observation and control problems of timed Petri nets. Finally, the max-plus algebraic approach to the analysis and control of choice-free systems is also considered. Control of Discrete-event Systems provides an introduction to discrete-event systems for readers that are not familiar with this class of systems, but also provides an introduction to research problems and open issues of current interest to readers already familiar with them. Most of the material in this book has been presented during a Ph.D. school held in Cagliari, Italy, in June 2011. This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Tools and Algorithms for the Construction and Analysis of Systems, TACAS '97, held in Enschede, The Netherlands, in April 1997. The book presents 20 revised full papers and 5 tool demonstrations carefully selected out of 54 submissions; also included are two extended abstracts and a full paper corresponding to invited talks. The papers are organized in topical sections on space reduction techniques, tool demonstrations, logical techniques, verification support, specification and analysis, and theorem proving, model checking and applications. The refereed proceedings of the 24th International Conference on Applications and Theory of Petri Nets, ICATPN 2003, held in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, in June 2003. The 25 revised full papers presented together with 6 invited contributions were carefully reviewed and selected from 77 submissions. All current issues on research and development in the area of Petri nets are addressed, in particular concurrent systems design and analysis, model checking, networking, business process modeling, formal methods in software engineering, agent systems, systems specification, systems validation, discrete event systems, protocols, and prototyping. The contents of this volume are application oriented. The volume contains a de tailed presentation of 19 applications of CP-nets, covering a broad range of ap plication areas. Most of the projects have been carried out in an industrial set ting.

Coloured Petri Nets Basic Concepts, Analysis Methods and Practical Use

char ticky=0x22;char *first="main(){printf(";char *second="char ti cky=0x22;char *first=%c%s%c;char *second=%c%s%c;char *third=%c%s%c ;%s%c%s%c%s";char *third=",ticky,first,ticky,ticky,second,ticky,ti cky,third,ticky,first,ticky,second,ticky,third);}";main(){printf(" char ticky=0x22;char *first=%c%s%c;char *second=%c%s%c;char *third =%c%s%c;%s%c%s%c%s",ticky,first,ticky,ticky,second,ticky,ticky,thi rd,ticky,first,ticky,second,ticky,third);}

On Fixed Points

Introduction to Lattices and Order: Appendix B: further reading

Reaction systems are a formal framework for investigating processes carried out by biochemical reactions. This paper is an introduction to reaction systems. It provides basic notions together with the underlying intuition and motivation as well as two examples (a binary counter and transition systems) of "programming" with reaction systems. It also provides a tour of some research themes.

A tour of reaction systems

We study the interplay between the principal pivot transform (pivot) and loop complementation for graphs. This is done by generalizing loop complementation (in addition to pivot) to set systems. We show that the operations together, when restricted to single vertices, form the permutation group S 3 . This leads, e.g., to a normal form for sequences of pivots and loop complementation on graphs. The results have consequences for the operations of local complementation and edge complementation on simple graphs: an alternative proof of a classic result involving local and edge complementation is obtained, and the effect of sequences of local complementations on simple graphs is characterized.

The group structure of pivot and loop complementation on graphs and set systems

A reaction system is essentially a finite set of reactions, where each reaction consists of a finite set of reactants (needed for the reaction to take place), a finite set of inhibitors (each of which inhibits the reaction from taking place), and a finite set of products produced when the reaction takes place A crucial feature of a reaction system is that (unless introduced from outside the system) an element (entity) from a current state will belong also to the successor state only if it is in the product set of a reaction that took place in the current state In other words, an entity vanishes unless it is sustained by a reaction -- a sort of "immediate decay" property In this paper we relax this property, by providing each entity x with its duration d(x), which guarantees that x will last through at least d(x) consecutive states Such reaction systems with duration are investigated in this paper Among others we demonstrate that duration/decay is a result of an interaction with a "structured environment", and we also investigate fundamental properties of state sequences of reaction systems with duration

Robert Brijder

Papers

A tour of reaction systems

The group structure of pivot and loop complementation on graphs and set systems

Reaction systems with duration

Interlace polynomials for multimatroids and delta-matroids

Reducibility of gene patterns in ciliates using the breakpoint graph