The noisy broadcast model was first studied in [Gallager, TranInf'88] where an @math -character input is distributed among @math processors, so that each processor receives one input bit. Computation proceeds in rounds, where in each round each processor broadcasts a single character, and each reception is corrupted independently at random with some probability @math . [Gallager, TranInf'88] gave an algorithm for all processors to learn the input in @math rounds with high probability. Later, a matching lower bound of @math was given in [Goyal, Kindler, Saks; SICOMP'08]. We study a relaxed version of this model where each reception is erased and replaced with a ?' independently with probability @math . In this relaxed model, we break past the lower bound of [Goyal, Kindler, Saks; SICOMP'08] and obtain an @math -round algorithm for all processors to learn the input with high probability. We also show an @math -round algorithm for the same problem when the alphabet size is @math .
A related problem was studied in @cite_1 where the broadcast model assumed was sequential, where in one round only one processor can broadcast a bit. Additionally, the noise model assumed was that of bit flips instead of erasures. That is, each transmitted bit is independently flipped with probability @math on the receiving end. In their model, @cite_1 shows that all the processors can learn the entire input within @math rounds. However, it left open the question of whether a faster protocol was possible.
@cite_1
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Abstract We consider a broadcast network of n processors in which each bit transmitted by each processor is received by each other processor via a noisy channel. Each processor has a binary input, and the problem is to construct a reliable distributed algorithm to determine whether at least one processor has the input 1. We show that this can be done with O ( log ∗ n) bits of communication from each processor, under an adversarial noise model. In this model, a processor receives a broadcasted bit correctly with some base probability q . The adversary may choose to correct the values of corrupted messages, but may not corrupt the values of correctly received messages. A set of n players, each holding a private input bit, communicate over a noisy broadcast channel. Their mutual goal is for all players to learn all inputs. At each round one of the players broadcasts a bit to all the other players, and the bit received by each player is flipped with a fixed constant probability (independently for each recipient). How many rounds are needed? This problem was first suggested by El Gamal in 1984. In 1988, Gallager gave an elegant noise-resistant protocol requiring only O(n loglogn) rounds. The problem got resolved in 2005 by a seminal paper of Goyal, Kindler, and Saks, proving that Gallager’s protocol is essentially optimal. We revisit the above noisy broadcast problem and show that O(n) rounds suffice. This is possible due to a relaxation of the model assumed by the previous works. We no longer demand that exactly one player broadcasts in every round, but rather allow any number of players to broadcast. However, if it is not the case that exactly one player chooses to broadcast, each of the other players gets an adversely chosen bit. We generalized the above result and initiate the study of interactive coding over the noisy broadcast channel. We show that any interactive protocol that works over the noiseless broadcast channel can be simulated over our restrictive noisy broadcast model with constant blowup of the communication. Our results also establish that modern techniques for interactive coding can help us make progress on the classical problems. We consider a fault tolerance broadcast network of n processors each holding one bit of information. The goal is to compute a given Boolean function on the n bits. In each step, a processor may broadcast one bit of information. Each listening processor receives the bit that was broadcasted with error probability bounded by a fixed constant spl epsi . The errors in different steps, as well as for different receiving processors in the same step, are mutually independent. The protocols that are considered in this model are oblivious protocols: At each step, the processors that broadcast are fixed in advanced and independent of the input and the outcome of previous steps. The primal complexity measure in this model is the total number of broadcasts that is performed by the protocol. We present here the first linear complexity protocols for several classes of Boolean functions, including the OR function, functions that have O(l)-minterm (maxterm) size, functions that have linear size AC sub 0 formulae and some other functions. This answer an open question of Yao (1997), considering this fault tolerance model of El-Gamal (1984) and Gallager (1988). We prove the first nontrivial (superlinear) lower bound in the noisy broadcast model, defined by El Gamal in [Open problems presented at the @math workshop on Specific Problems in Communication and Computation sponsored by Bell Communication Research, in Open Problems in Communication and Computation, T. M. Cover and B. Gopinath, eds., Springer-Verlag, New York, 1987, pp. 60-62]. In this model there are @math processors @math , each of which is initially given a private input bit @math . The goal is for @math to learn the value of @math , for some specified function @math , using a series of noisy broadcasts. At each step a designated processor broadcasts one bit to all of the other processors, and the bit received by each processor is flipped with fixed probability (independently for each recipient). In 1988, Gallager [IEEE Trans. Inform. Theory, 34 (1988), pp. 176-180] gave a noise-resistant protocol that allows @math to learn the entire input with constant probability in @math broadcasts. We prove that Gallager's protocol is optimal, up to a constant factor. Our lower bound follows by reduction from a lower bound for generalized noisy decision trees, a new model which may be of independent interest. For this new model we show a lower bound of @math on the depth of a tree that learns the entire input. While the above lower bound is for an @math -bit function, we also show an @math lower bound for the number of broadcasts required to compute certain explicit boolean-valued functions, when the correct output must be attained with probability at least @math for a constant parameter @math (this bound applies to all threshold functions as well as any other boolean-valued function with linear sensitivity). This bound also follows by reduction from a lower bound of @math on the depth of generalized noisy decision trees that compute the same functions with the same error. We also show a (nontrivial) @math lower bound on the depth of generalized noisy decision trees that compute such functions with small constant error. Finally, we show the first protocol in the noisy broadcast model that computes the Hamming weight of the input using a linear number of broadcasts.