Randomized rumor spreading
Karp, R.
Schindelhauer, C.
Shenker, S.
Vocking, B.
California Univ., Berkeley, CA;
This paper appears in: Foundations of Computer Science, 2000. Proceedings. 41st Annual Symposium on
Publication Date: 2000
On page(s): 565-574
Meeting Date: 11/12/2000 - 11/14/2000
Location: Redondo Beach, CA, USA
ISBN: 0-7695-0850-2
References Cited: 12
INSPEC Accession Number: 6894017
Digital Object Identifier: 10.1109/SFCS.2000.892324
Current Version Published: 2002-08-06
Abstract
Investigates the class of epidemic algorithms that are commonly
used for the lazy transmission of updates to distributed copies of a
database. These algorithms use a simple randomized communication
mechanism to ensure robustness. Suppose n players communicate in
parallel rounds in each of which every player calls a randomly selected
communication partner. In every round, players can generate rumors
(updates) that are to be distributed among all players. Whenever
communication is established between two players, each one must decide
which of the rumors to transmit. The major problem is that players might
not know which rumors their partners have already received. For example,
a standard algorithm forwarding each rumor form the calling to the
called players for Θ(ln n) rounds needs to transmit the rumor
Θ(n ln n) times in order to ensure that every player finally
receives the rumor with high probability. We investigate whether such a
large communication overhead is inherent to epidemic algorithms. On the
positive side, we show that the communication overhead can be reduced
significantly. We give an algorithm using only O(n ln ln n)
transmissions and O(ln n) rounds. In addition, we prove the robustness
of this algorithm. On the negative side, we show that any
address-oblivious algorithm needs to send Ω(n ln ln n) messages
for each rumor, regardless of the number of rounds. Furthermore, we give
a general lower bound showing that time and communication optimality
cannot be achieved simultaneously using random phone calls, i.e. every
algorithm that distributes a rumor in O(ln n) rounds needs ω(n)
transmissions
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