Tight Conditions for Binary-Output Tasks under Crashes

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Albouy, Timothé, Anta, Antonio Fernández, Georgiou, Chryssis, Nicolaou, Nicolas, Wang, Junlang
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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author Albouy, Timothé
Anta, Antonio Fernández
Georgiou, Chryssis
Nicolaou, Nicolas
Wang, Junlang
author_facet Albouy, Timothé
Anta, Antonio Fernández
Georgiou, Chryssis
Nicolaou, Nicolas
Wang, Junlang
contents This paper explores necessary and sufficient system conditions to solve distributed tasks with binary outputs (\textit{i.e.}, tasks with output values in $\{0,1\}$). We focus on the distinct output sets of values a task can produce (intentionally disregarding validity and value multiplicity), considering that some processes may output no value. In a distributed system with $n$ processes, of which up to $t \leq n$ can crash, we provide a complete characterization of the tight conditions on $n$ and $t$ under which every class of tasks with binary outputs is solvable, for both synchronous and asynchronous systems. This output-set approach yields highly general results: it unifies multiple distributed computing problems, such as binary consensus and symmetry breaking, and it produces impossibility proofs that hold for stronger task formulations, including those that consider validity, account for value multiplicity, or move beyond binary outputs.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2510_13755
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Tight Conditions for Binary-Output Tasks under Crashes
Albouy, Timothé
Anta, Antonio Fernández
Georgiou, Chryssis
Nicolaou, Nicolas
Wang, Junlang
Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
This paper explores necessary and sufficient system conditions to solve distributed tasks with binary outputs (\textit{i.e.}, tasks with output values in $\{0,1\}$). We focus on the distinct output sets of values a task can produce (intentionally disregarding validity and value multiplicity), considering that some processes may output no value. In a distributed system with $n$ processes, of which up to $t \leq n$ can crash, we provide a complete characterization of the tight conditions on $n$ and $t$ under which every class of tasks with binary outputs is solvable, for both synchronous and asynchronous systems. This output-set approach yields highly general results: it unifies multiple distributed computing problems, such as binary consensus and symmetry breaking, and it produces impossibility proofs that hold for stronger task formulations, including those that consider validity, account for value multiplicity, or move beyond binary outputs.
title Tight Conditions for Binary-Output Tasks under Crashes
topic Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.13755