We present a quasi linear-time algorithm for Maximum Matching on distance-hereditary graphs and some of their generalizations. This improves on [Dragan, WG'97], who proposed such an algorithm for the subclass of (tent,hexahedron)-free distance-hereditary graphs. Furthermore, our result is derived from a more general one that is obtained for b-Matching. In the (unit cost) b-Matching problem, we are given a graph G = (V, E) together with a nonnegative integer capacity b v for every vertex v ∈ V. The objective is to assign nonnegative integer weights (x e) e∈E so that: for every v ∈ V the sum of the weights of its incident edges does not exceed b v , and e∈E x e is maximized. We present the first algorithm for solving b-Matching on cographs, distance-hereditary graphs and some of their generalizations in quasi linear time. For that, we use a decomposition algorithm that outputs for any graph G a collection of subgraphs of G with no edge-cutsets inducing a complete bipartite subgraph (a.k.a., splits). The latter collection is sometimes called a split decomposition of G. Furthermore, there exists a generic method in order to design graph algorithms based on split decomposition [Rao, DAM'08]. However, this technique only applies to " localized " problems: for which a " best " partial solution for any given subgraph in a split decomposition can be computed almost independently from the remaining of the graph. Such framework does not apply to matching problems since an augmenting path may cross the subgraphs arbitrarily. We introduce a new technique that somehow captures all the partial solutions for a given union of subgraphs in a split decomposition, in a compact and amenable way for algorithms — assuming some piecewise linear assumption holds on the value of such solutions. The latter assumption is shown to hold for b-Matching. Doing so, we prove that solving b-Matching on any pair G, b can be reduced in quasi linear-time to solving this problem on a collection of smaller graphs: that are obtained from the subgraphs in any split decomposition of G by replacing every vertex with a constant-size module. In particular, if G has a split decomposition where all subgraphs have order at most a fixed k, then we can solve b-Matching for G, b in O((k log 2 k)·(m+n)·log ||b|| 1)-time. This answers an open question of [, SODA'18].
A composition for directed graphs which generalizes the substitution (or X-join) composition of graphs and digraphs, as well as the graph version of set-family composition, is described. It is proved that a general decomposition theory can be applied to the resulting digraph decomposition. A consequence is a theorem which asserts the uniqueness of a decomposition of any digraph, each member of the decomposition being either indecomposable or “special”. The special digraphs are completely characterized; they are members of a few interesting classes. Efficient decomposition algorithms are also presented. In this paper, we revisit the split decomposition of graphs and give new combinatorial and algorithmic results for the class of totally decomposable graphs, also known as the distance hereditary graphs, and for two non-trivial subclasses, namely the cographs and the 3-leaf power graphs. Precisely, we give structural and incremental characterizations, leading to optimal fully dynamic recognition algorithms for vertex and edge modifications, for each of these classes. These results rely on the new combinatorial framework of graph-labelled trees used to represent the split decomposition of general graphs (and also the modular decomposition). The point of the paper is to use bijections between the aforementioned graph classes and graph-labelled trees whose nodes are labelled by cliques and stars. We mention that this bijective viewpoint yields directly an intersection model for the class of distance hereditary graphs.