Towards an algorithmisation of the Dirac constraint formalism

Central issues of the Dirac constraint formalism are discussed in relation to the algorithmic methods of commutative algebra based on the Groebner basis techniques. For a wide class of finite dimensional polynomial degenerate Lagrangian systems, we describe an algorithmic scheme of computation of the complete set of constraints, their separation into subsets of first and second class constraints as well as the construction of a generator of local symmetry transformations. The proposed scheme is exemplified by considering the so-called light-cone Yang-Mills mechanics with an SU(2) gauge structure group.