English

Non-erasing Chomsky-Sch{\"u}tzenberger theorem with grammar-independent alphabet

Formal Languages and Automata Theory 2018-05-11 v1

Abstract

The famous theorem by Chomsky and Sch\"utzenberger (CST) says that every context-free language LL over an alphabet Σ\Sigma is representable as h(DR)h(D \cap R), where DD is a Dyck language over a set Ω\Omega of brackets, RR is a local language and hh is an alphabetic homomorphism that erases unboundedly many symbols. Berstel found that the number of erasures can be linearly limited if the grammar is in Greibach normal form; Berstel and Boasson (and later, independently, Okhotin) proved a non-erasing variant of CST for grammars in Double Greibach Normal Form. In all these CST statements, however, the size of the Dyck alphabet Ω\Omega depends on the grammar size for LL. In the Stanley variant of the CST, Ω|\Omega| only depends on Σ|\Sigma| and not on the grammar, but the homomorphism erases many more symbols than in the other versions of CST; also, the regular language RR is strictly locally testable but not local. We prove a new version of CST which combines both features of being non-erasing and of using a grammar-independent alphabet. In our construction, Ω|\Omega| is polynomial in Σ|\Sigma|, namely O(Σ46)O(|\Sigma|^{46}), and the regular language RR is strictly locally testable. Using a recent generalization of Medvedev's homomorphic characterization of regular languages, we prove that the degree in the polynomial dependence of Ω|\Omega| on Σ|\Sigma| may be reduced to just 2 in the case of linear grammars in Double Greibach Normal Form.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1805.04003,
  title  = {Non-erasing Chomsky-Sch{\"u}tzenberger theorem with grammar-independent alphabet},
  author = {Stefano Crespi Reghizzi and Pierluigi San Pietro},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1805.04003},
  year   = {2018}
}

Comments

27 pages. Early versions of parts of this work have been presented at the LATA 2016 Conf. and at the Conf. dedicated to the scientific legacy of M.P. Sch\"utzenberger, 2017