Links' Seminars and Public Events | ![]() ![]() |
Fri, March 24, 2023 10:00 am 11:00 am | Séminaire Mamadou KANTE |
Fri, January 20, 2023 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar by Tito Speaker: Lê Thành Dũng Nguyễn, aka “Tito” — nguyentito.eu/ Title: Polyregular functions: some recent developments Abstract: The class of polyregular functions is composed of the string-to-string functions computed by pebble transducers. While this machine model (which extends two-way finite transducers) is two decades old, several alternative characterizations of polyregular functions have been discovered recently [Bojańczyk 2018; Bojańczyk, Kiefer & Lhote 2019], demonstrating their canonicity. The name comes from the polynomial bound on the growth rate of these functions: |f(w)| = |w|^O(1) where |w| is the length of the string w. In this talk, after recalling this context, I will present some subsequent developments in which I have been involved: * the subclass of comparison-free polyregular (or “polyblind”) functions, definable through a natural restriction of pebble transducers, which Pierre Pradic and I actually discovered while studying a linear λ-calculus; * some results that either relate the growth rate of a polyregular function (comparison-free or not) to the “resources” needed to compute it, or show that there is no such relationship. |
Fri, January 13, 2023 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar by Sarah Winter Speaker: Sarah Winter — sarahwinter.net/ Title: A Regular and Complete Notion of Delay for Streaming String Transducers Abstract: The notion of delay between finite transducers is a core element of numerous fundamental results of transducer theory. The goal of this work is to provide a similar notion for more complex abstract machines: we introduce a new notion of delay tailored to measure the similarity between streaming string transducers (SST). We show that our notion is regular: we design a finite automaton that can check whether the delay between any two SSTs executions is smaller than some given bound. As a consequence, our notion enjoys good decidability properties: in particular, while equivalence between non-deterministic SSTs is undecidable, we show that equivalence up to fixed delay is decidable. Moreover, we show that our notion has good completeness properties: we prove that two SSTs are equivalent if and only if they are equivalent up to some (computable) bounded delay. Together with the regularity of our delay notion, it provides an alternative proof that SSTs equivalence is decidable. Finally, the definition of our delay notion is machine-independent, as it only depends on the origin semantics of SSTs. As a corollary, the completeness result also holds for equivalent machine models such as deterministic two-way transducers, or MSO transducers. This is joint work with Emmanuel Filiot, Ismaël Jecker, and Christof Löding. |
Fri, December 16, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar by Sandra Kiefer CANCELLED: we will attempt to reschedule this seminar to early 2023. Speaker: Sandra Kiefer — www.lics.rwth-aachen.d.....dx/1/ Title: TBA Abstract: TBA |
Fri, December 9, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar by Rémi Morvan Speaker: Rémi Morvan — www.morvan.xyz/ Titre: Approximation and Semantic Tree-width of Conjunctive Regular Path Queries Abstract: We show that the problem of whether a query is equivalent to a query of tree-width k is decidable, for the class of Unions of Conjunctive Regular Path Queries with two-way navigation (UC2RPQs). A previous result by Barceló, Romero, and Vardi has shown decidability for the case k=1, and here we show that decidability in fact holds for any arbitrary k>1. The algorithm is in 2ExpSpace, but we show that the complexity drops to the second level of the polynomial hierarchy for a restricted but practically relevant case of queries obtained by only allowing simple regular expressions. We also investigate the related problem of approximating a UC2RPQ by queries of small tree-width. We exhibit an algorithm which, for any fixed number k, builds the maximal under-approximation of tree-width k of a UC2RPQ. The maximal under-approximation of tree-width k of a query q is a query q' of tree-width k which is contained in q in a maximal and unique way, that is, such that for every query q'' of tree-width k, if q'' is contained in q then q'' is also contained in q'. Joint work with Diego Figueira. |
Fri, November 18, 2022 11:00 am 11:30 am | Seminar by Sarah Winter CANCELLED for COVID: we will attempt to reschedule this seminar to early 2023 Speaker: Sarah Winter — sarahwinter.net/ Title: A Regular and Complete Notion of Delay for Streaming String Transducers Abstract: The notion of delay between finite transducers is a core element of numerous fundamental results of transducer theory. The goal of this work is to provide a similar notion for more complex abstract machines: we introduce a new notion of delay tailored to measure the similarity between streaming string transducers (SST). We show that our notion is regular: we design a finite automaton that can check whether the delay between any two SSTs executions is smaller than some given bound. As a consequence, our notion enjoys good decidability properties: in particular, while equivalence between non-deterministic SSTs is undecidable, we show that equivalence up to fixed delay is decidable. Moreover, we show that our notion has good completeness properties: we prove that two SSTs are equivalent if and only if they are equivalent up to some (computable) bounded delay. Together with the regularity of our delay notion, it provides an alternative proof that SSTs equivalence is decidable. Finally, the definition of our delay notion is machine-independent, as it only depends on the origin semantics of SSTs. As a corollary, the completeness result also holds for equivalent machine models such as deterministic two-way transducers, or MSO transducers. This is joint work with Emmanuel Filiot, Ismaël Jecker, and Christof Löding. |
Fri, October 21, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Online seminar by Pierre Pradic Speaker: Pierre Pradic — perso.ens-lyon.fr/pierre.pradic/ Title: Synthesizing Nested Relational Queries from Implicit Specifications Abstract: Derived datasets can be defined implicitly or explicitly. An implicit definition (of dataset O in terms of datasets I⃗ ) is a logical specification involving the source data I⃗ and the interface data O. It is a valid definition of O in terms of I⃗ , if any two models of the specification agreeing on I⃗ agree on O. In contrast, an explicit definition is a query that produces O from I⃗ . Variants of Beth's theorem state that one can convert implicit definitions to explicit ones. Further, this conversion can be done effectively given a proof witnessing implicit definability in a suitable proof system. In this talk, I will discuss an analogous effective implicit-to-explicit result for nested relations: implicit definitions, given in the natural logic for nested relations, can be effectively converted to explicit definitions in the nested relational calculus NRC. I will first spend some time explaining what NRC is and what logic we use to describe implicit definitions of nested queries. Then I will present the results obtained in our papers, attempt to give some intuitions on the proof of the main theorem and say a few words on in particular the proof-theoretic techniques and concerns that come up (namely, cut-elimination and focussing) and how this can impact the complexity of extracting explicit definitions from proofs of implicit definability. Then if time allows I will discuss a more general model-theoretic result that we first used to give a non-constructive proof of our theorem, and some ideas that we have towards making it constructive and bounding the complexity of extracting explicit definitions. This is Joint work with Michael Benedikt and Christoph Wenhard. The main results I will be discussing were written up in arxiv.org/abs/2005.06503 and arxiv.org/abs/2209.08299. Online |
Fri, September 30, 2022 10:00 am 11:30 am | Seminar by Liat Peterfreund Speaker: Liat Peterfreund — sites.google.com/view/liatpeterfreund/ Title: Querying Incomplete Numerical Data: Between Certain and Possible Answers Abstract: Queries with aggregation and arithmetic operations, as well as incomplete data, are common in real-world databases, but we lack a good understanding of how they should interact. On the one hand, systems based on SQL provide ad-hoc rules for numerical nulls, on the other, theoretical research largely concentrates on the standard notions of certain and possible answers which in the presence of numerical attributes and aggregates are often meaningless. In this work, we define a principled compositional framework for databases with numerical nulls and answering queries with arithmetic and aggregations over them. We assume that missing values are given by probability distributions associated with marked nulls, which yields a model of probabilistic bag databases. We concentrate on queries that resemble standard SQL with arithmetic and aggregation and show that they are measurable, and that their outputs have a finite representation. Moreover, since the classical forms of answers provide little information in the numerical setting, we look at the probability that numerical values in output tuples belong to specific intervals. Even though their exact computation is intractable, we show efficient approximation algorithms to compute such probabilities. The talk is based on joint work with Marco Console and Leonid Libkin, and will be presented in PODS 2023. |
Fri, September 16, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar Luis Galárraga Speaker : Luis Galárraga — luisgalarraga.de/about/ Title: Computing How-Provenance for SPARQL Queries via Query Rewriting Abstract: Over the past few years, we have witnessed the emergence of large knowledge graphs built by extracting and combining information from multiple sources. This has propelled many advances in query processing over knowledge graphs, however the aspect of providing provenance explanations for query results has so far been mostly neglected. In this talk I will present SPARQLprov, a method based on query rewriting, to compute how-provenance polynomials for SPARQL queries over knowledge graphs. Contrary to existing works, SPARQLprov is system-agnostic and can be applied to standard and already deployed SPARQL engines without the need of customized extensions. To do so, we rely on spm-semirings to compute polynomial annotations that respect the property of commutation with homomorphisms on monotonic and non-monotonic SPARQL queries without aggregate functions. An evaluation on real and synthetic data shows that SPARQLprov over standard engines competes with state-of-the-art solutions for how-provenance computation, while covering a larger fragment of the query language. |
Fri, July 1, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire Arnaud Durand |
Fri, June 10, 2022 10:00 am 11:00 am | Séminaire Corentin Barloy Title:The Regular Languages of First-Order Logic with One Alternation Abstract: The regular languages with a neutral letter expressible in first-order logic with one alternation are characterized. Specifically, it is shown that if an arbitrary Σ2 formula defines a regular language with a neutral letter, then there is an equivalent Σ2 formula that only uses the order predicate. This shows that the so-called Central Conjecture of Straubing holds for Σ2 over languages with a neutral letter, the first progress on the Conjecture in more than 20 years. To show the characterization, lower bounds against polynomial-size depth-3 Boolean circuits with constant top fan-in are developed. The heart of the combinatorial argument resides in studying how positions within a language are determined from one another, a technique of independent interest. |
Fri, February 25, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire Nico |
Fri, January 28, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Alexandre Vigny (visio) Title: Separator logic, expressive power and algorithmic applications Abstract: First-order logic (FO) can express many algorithmic problems on graphs, but fails to express whether two vertices are connected. We define a new logic (separator logic) by enriching FO with connectivity predicates connk(x, y, z1, . . . , zk) that hold true in a graph if there exists a path between x and y after deletion of z1, . . . , zk. In this talk I will first present a study of the expressive power of this new logic. I will then present algorithmic results for this logic on graph classes that exclude a topological minor. These results were obtained in collaboration with Michał Pilipczuk, Nicole Schirrmacher, Sebastian Siebertz, and Szymon Toruńczyk. |
Fri, January 21, 2022 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Aurélien Lemay in Seminar |
Fri, December 10, 2021 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire Sebastien Tavenas Title: Bornes inférieures superpolynomiales pour les circuits de profondeur constante Abstract: Tout polynôme multivarié P(X_1,...,X_n) peut être écrit comme une somme de monômes, i.e., une somme de produits de variables et de constantes du corps. La taille naturelle d'une telle expression est le nombre de monômes. Mais, que se passe-t-il si on rajoute un nouveau niveau de complexité en considérant les expressions de la forme : somme de produits de sommes (de variables et de constantes) ? Maintenant, il devient moins clair comment montrer qu'un polynôme donné n'a pas de petite expression. Dans cet exposé nous résoudrons exactement ce problème. Plus précisément, nous prouvons que certains polynômes explicites n'ont pas de représentations "somme de produits de sommes'' (SPS) de taille polynomiale. Nous pouvons aussi obtenir des résultats similaires pour les SPSP, SPSPS, etc... pour toutes les expressions de profondeur constante. " |
Thu, November 25, 2021 2:00 pm 3:00 pm | Nofar Carmeli in Links' Seminar |
Fri, October 29, 2021 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire Antoine Amarilli |
Fri, October 22, 2021 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Mikaël Monet in Links' Seminar |
Fri, October 15, 2021 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Claire Soyez-Martin in Links' seminar |
Fri, September 17, 2021 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire Corentin Barloy Title: Stackless Processing of Streamed Trees Abstract: Processing tree-structured data in the streaming model is a chal-lenge: capturing regular properties of streamed trees by means of astack is costly in memory, but falling back to finite-state automata drastically limits the computational power. We propose an intermediate stackless model based on register automata equipped with a single counter, used to maintain the current depth in the tree. We explore the power of this model to validate and query streamed trees. Our main result is an effective characterization of regular path queries (RPQs) that can be evaluated stacklessly—with and without registers. In particular, we confirm the conjectured characterization of tree languages defined by DTDs that are recognizable without registers, by Segoufin and Vianu (2002), in the special case of tree languages defined by means of an RPQ. Link: paperman.name/data/pub.....0.pdf lille-Salle |
Fri, September 10, 2021 10:00 am 11:00 am | Séminaire de Patrick Baillot titre: Type-based complexity analysis in a parallel process calculus Abstract: Some type systems have been designed to analyse statically the time coplexity of functional languages. A natural question is whether this approach can be extended to parallel languages. We address this problem for the Pi-calculus, a paradigmatic calculus for parallel and concurrent computation. In Pi-calculus, processes communicate through channels that can carry values and channel names. We will define notions of sequential and parallel complexity for Pi-calculus, and present a type system that provides an upper bound on the time complexity of processes. This is based on joint work with Alexis Ghyselen (ESOP 2021). Based on: link.springer.com/chap.....9-3_3 |
Fri, July 9, 2021 all day | Seminar - Antonio AL SERHALI Title: Integrating Schema-Based Cleaning into Automata Determinization Abstract : Schema-based cleaning for automata on trees or nested words was proposed recently to compute smaller deterministic automata for regular path queries on data trees. The idea is to remove all rules and states, from an automaton for the query, that are not needed to recognize any tree recognized by a given schema automaton. Unfortunately, how- ever, deterministic automata for nested words may still grow large for au- tomata for XPath queries, so that the much smaller schema-cleaned ver- sion cannot always be computed in practice. We therefore propose a new schema-based determinization algorithm that integrates schema-based cleaning directly. We prove that schema-based determinization always produces the same deterministic automaton as schema-based cleaning after standard determinization. Nevertheless, the worst-case complex- ity is considerably lower for schema-based determinization. Experiments confirm the relevance of this result in practice. |
Fri, June 4, 2021 10:00 am 12:30 pm | Séminaire Pierre Ohlmann Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 Titre: Lower bound for arithmetic circuits via the Hankel matrix Abstract: We study the complexity of representing polynomials by arithmetic circuits in both the commutative and the non-commutative settings. To analyse circuits we count their number of parse trees, which describe the non-associative computations realised by the circuit. In the non-commutative setting a circuit computing a polynomial of degree d has at most 2^{O(d)} parse trees. Previous superpolynomial lower bounds were known for circuits with up to 2^{d^{1/3-ε}} parse trees, for any ε>0. Our main result is to reduce the gap by showing a superpolynomial lower bound for circuits with just a small defect in the exponent for the total number of parse trees, that is 2^{d^{1-ε}}, for any ε>0. In the commutative setting a circuit computing a polynomial of degree d has at most 2^{O(d \\log d)} parse trees. We show a superpolynomial lower bound for circuits with up to 2^{d^{1/3-ε}} parse trees, for any ε>0. When d is polylogarithmic in n, we push this further to up to 2^{d^{1-ε}} parse trees. While these two main results hold in the associative setting, our approach goes through a precise understanding of the more restricted setting where multiplication is not associative, meaning that we distinguish the polynomials (xy)z and yz). Our first and main conceptual result is a characterization result: we show that the size of the smallest circuit computing a given non-associative polynomial is exactly the rank of a matrix constructed from the polynomial and called the Hankel matrix. This result applies to the class of all circuits in both commutative and non-commutative settings, and can be seen as an extension of the seminal result of Nisan giving a similar characterization for non-commutative algebraic branching programs. Our key technical contribution is to provide generic lower bound theorems based on analyzing and decomposing the Hankel matrix, from which we derive the results mentioned above. The study of the Hankel matrix also provides a unifying approach for proving lower bounds for polynomials in the (classical) associative setting. We demonstrate this by giving alternative proofs of recent lower bounds as corollaries of our generic lower bound results. |
Fri, May 28, 2021 10:00 am 11:00 am | Seminar Anastasia Dimou Title: Knowledge graph generation and validation |
Fri, May 21, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar Dimitrios Myrisiotis Title : One-Tape Turing Machine and Branching Program Lower Bounds for MCSP Abstract: eccc.weizmann.ac.il/report/2020/103/ Speaker' webpage : dimyrisiotis.github.io/ zoom |
Fri, May 7, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar Nicole Schweikardt Title: Spanner Evaluation over SLP-Compressed Documents Abstract: We consider the problem of evaluating regular spanners over compressed documents, i.e., we wish to solve evaluation tasks directly on the compressed data, without decompression. As compressed forms of the documents we use straight-line programs (SLPs) -- a lossless compression scheme for textual data widely used in different areas of theoretical computer science and particularly well-suited for algorithmics on compressed data. In terms of data complexity, our results are as follows. For a regular spanner M and an SLP S that represents a document D, we can solve the tasks of model checking and of checking non-emptiness in time O(size(S)). Computing the set M(D) of all span-tuples extracted from D can be done in time O(size(S) size(M(D))), and enumeration of M(D) can be done with linear preprocessing O(size(S)) and a delay of O(depth(S)), where depth(S) is the depth of S's derivation tree. Note that size(S) can be exponentially smaller than the document's size |D|; and, due to known balancing results for SLPs, we can always assume that depth(S) = O(log(|D|)) independent of D's compressibility. Hence, our enumeration algorithm has a delay logarithmic in the size of the non- compressed data and a preprocessing time that is at best (i.e., in the case of highly compressible documents) also logarithmic, but at worst still linear. Therefore, in a big-data perspective, our enumeration algorithm for SLP-compressed documents may nevertheless beat the known linear preprocessing and constant delay algorithms for non-compressed documents. [This is joint work with Markus Schmid, to be presented at PODS'21.] Link to the paper: arxiv.org/pdf/2101.10890.pdf for the paper at least Link to the ACM video: TBA |
Fri, April 30, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Présentation de NetworkDisk Je présenterais mon projet avec Bruno: NetworkDisk. Abstract and Title: TBA link to the project: TBA |
Fri, April 9, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminaire Pascal Weil titre: Problèmes algorithmiques en théorie des groupes infinis resumé: Malgré le titre très général, il s'agira uniquement de problèmes concernant les sous-groupes de groupes infinis, et même juste les sous-groupes de groupes libres. Les résultats et méthodes que je présenterai sont issus de près de 40 ans de littérature et sont dûs à un grand nombre d'auteurs. Je commencerai par poser le paysage, y compris pour ceux qui ne savent plus ce qu'est le groupe libre -- où l'on verra qu'on est, du point de vue algorithmique, dans une variante de la combinatoire des mots. Je présenterai ensuite l'outil central de la plupart des algorithmes efficaces sur les sous-groupes du groupe libre : la représentation de chaque sous-groupe finiment engendré par un graphe étiqueté et enraciné (disons : d'un automate :-)…) unique et facilement calculable à partir d'un ensemble de générateurs du sous-groupe considéré, qu'on appelle le graphe de Stallings. Le jeu consiste ensuite à traduire les problèmes algorithmiques sur les sous-groupes en problèmes algorithmiques sur les graphes de Stallings, et à résoudre ces problèmes de la façon la plus efficace possible. On considèrera notamment les problèmes suivants -- bon, juste le début de cette longue liste. - Le problème du mot généralisé : étant donnés k+1 éléments du groupe libre (ce sont des mots), le dernier appartient-il au sous-groupe engendré par les k premiers ? - Le problème de l'indice : étant donné un tuple d'éléments du groupe libre, le sous-groupe qu'ils engendrent est-il d'indice fini ? - Le problème de la base : étant donné un tuple d'éléments du groupe libre, trouver le rang, et une base du sous-groupe qu'ils engendrent. - Le problème de l'intersection : étant donnés deux tuples d'éléments du groupe libre, calculer l'intersection des sous-groupes qu'ils engendrent (ou calculer une base de cette intersection). - Le problème de la conjugaison : étant donnés deux tuples d'éléments du groupe libre, engendrent-ils le même sous-groupe ? deux sous-groupes conjugués ? - Et de nombreux autres problèmes (mots clés : minimalité de Whitehead, facteur libre, malnormalité, clôture par radical, clôture au sens de la topologie pro-p, etc…) title: Algorithmic problems in the theory of infinite groups abstract: In spite of the very general title, we will talk only about problems on subgroups of infinite groups, and in fact, only on subgroups of free groups . The results and methods I will present have been obtained over the past 40 years and are due to many researchers. I will start by setting the landscape, including for those who forgot what the free group is --- and we will see that we are dealing here, from the algorithmic point of view, with a variant of combinatorics on words. I will then present the tool that is central to most efficient algorithms on subgroups of free groups: the representation of each finitely generated subgroup by a labeled rooted graph (shall we say… an automaton?) which is unique and easily computable when a tuple of generators of the subgroup under consideration is given. This graph is called the Stallings graph. The game consists, then, in translating algorithmic problems on subgroups into algorithmic problems on Stallings graphs, and in solving these problems as efficiently as possible. We will discuss in particular the following problems (clearly: just the beginning of this long list). - The generalized word problem: given k+1 elements of the free group (these are words), does the last one belong to the subgroup generated by the k first ones? - The index problem: given a tuple of elements of the free group, does the subgroup they generate have finite index? - The basis problem: given a tuple of elements of the free group, find the rank and a basis of the subgroup they generate. - The intersection problem: given two tuples of elements of the free group, compute the intersection of the subgroups they generate (compute a basis of this intersection). - The conjugacy problem: given two tuples of elements of the free group, are the subgroups they generate equal? conjugated? - And many other problems (keywords: Whitehead minimality, free factors, malnormality, closure under radicals, closure in the sense of the pro-p topology, etc…) |
Fri, March 26, 2021 10:00 am 11:00 am | Séminaire Anne Etien Title: Managing structural and behavioral evolution in relational database: Application of Software Engineering techniques. Abstract: Relational databases play a central role in many information systems. Their schemas usually contain structural and behavioral entity descriptions. However, as any piece of software, they must continuously evolve to adapt to new requirements of a world in constant change. From an evolution point of view, problems are twofold: (1) relational database management systems do not allow inconsistencies i.e., no entity can reference a non existing entity; (2) stored procedures bodies are not described by meta-data i.e., DBMS as PostgreSQL consider stored procedure bodies as plain text and references to entities are unknown. As a consequence, evaluating the impact of an evolution of the database schema is a difficult task. In this seminar, we present a semi-automatic approach based on recommendations (sort of nested code transformations). Recommendations are proposed to architects who select the ones fitting their needs. Selected recommendations are then analysed and compiled to generate SQL script respecting the constraints imposed by the RDBMS. To support recommendations, we designed a meta-model for relational databases easing computation of change impact. We performed an experiment to validate the approach by reproducing a real evolution on a database. The results of our experiment show that our approach is able to reproduce exactly a manual modification in 75% less time. Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 |
Fri, March 19, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar Pablo Ferragin Title: Theory and practice of learning-based compressed data structures Presenter: Giorgio Vinciguerra Abstract: We revisit two fundamental and ubiquitous problems in data structure design: predecessor search and rank/select primitives. We show that real data present a peculiar kind of regularity based on geometric considerations. We name it “approximate linearity”. We thus expand the horizon of compressed data structures by presenting two solutions for the problems above that discover, or “learn”, in a principled algorithmic way, these approximate linearities. We provide a walkthrough of these new theoretical achievements, also with a focus on open-source libraries and their experimental improvements. We conclude by discussing the plethora of research opportunities that these new learning-based approaches to data structure design open up. Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 |
Fri, March 12, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar: Antonio AL SERHALI Title: Can Earliest Query Answering on Nested Streams be achieved in Combined Linear Time? |
Fri, February 19, 2021 10:00 am 11:00 am | Seminar: Bernardo Subercaseau Title: Foundations of Languages for Interpretability. Abstract: The area of interpretability in Machine Learning aims for the design of algorithms that we humans can understand and trust. One of the fundamental questions of interpretability is: given a classifier M, and an input vector x, why did M classify x as M(x)? In order to approximate an answer to this "why" question, many concrete queries, metrics and scores have emerged as proxies, and their complexity has been studied over different classes of models. Many of these analyses are ad-hoc, but they tend to agree on the fact that these queries and scores are hard to compute over Neural Networks, but easy to compute over Decision Trees. It is thus natural to think of a more general approach, like a query language in which users could write an arbitrary number of different queries, and that would allow for a generalized study of the complexity of interpreting different ML models. Our work proposes foundations for such a language, tying to First Order Logic, as a way to have a clear understanding of its expressiveness and complexity. We manage to define a minimalistic structure over FO that allows expressing many natural interpretability queries over models, and we show that evaluating such queries can be done efficiently for Decision Trees, in data-complexity. Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 |
Fri, February 12, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar: Florent Capelli Title: Regularizing the delay of enumeration algorithms Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 Abstract: Enumeration algorithms are algorithms whose goal is to output the set of all solutions to a given problem. There exists different measures for the quality of such algorithm, whose relevance depends on what the user wants to do with the solutions set. If the goal of the user is to explore some solutions or to transform the solutions as they are outputted with a stream-like algorithm, a relevant measure of the complexity of an enumeration algorithm is the delay between the output of two distinct solutions. Following this line of thoughts, significant efforts have been made by the community to design polynomial delay algorithms, that is, algorithms whose delay between the output of two new solutions is polynomial in the size of the input. While this measure is interesting, it is not always completely necessary to have a bound on the delay and it is enough to ask for a guarantee that running the algorithm for O(t poly(n)) will result in the output of at least t solutions. Of course, by storing each solution seen and outputting them regularly, one can simulate a polynomial delay but if the number of solutions is large, it may result in a blow up in the space used by the enumerator. In this talk, we will present a new technique that allow to transform such algorithm into polynomial delay algorithm using polynomial space. This is joint work with Yann Strozecki. |
Fri, January 15, 2021 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Séminaire de Kim Nguyễn Titile: The BOLDR project Abstract: I n this presentation, I will give an account of the BOLDR project and perspectives in the field of language integrated queries. Several classes of solutions allow programming languages to express queries: specific APIs such as JDBC, Object-Relational Mappings (ORMs) such as Hibernate, and language-integrated query frameworks such as Microsoft's LINQ. However, most of these solutions do not allow for efficient cross-databases queries, and none allow the use of complex application logic from the programming language in queries. We study the design of a new language-integrated query framework called BOLDR that allows the evaluation in databases of queries written in general-purpose programming languages containing application logic, and targeting several databases following different data models. In this framework, application queries are translated to an intermediate representation. Then, they are typed with a type system extensible by databases in order to detect which database language each subexpression should be translated to. This type system also allows us to detect a class of errors before execution. Next, they are rewritten in order to avoid query avalanches and make the most out of database optimizations. Finally, queries are sent for evaluation to the corresponding databases and the results are converted back to the application. Our experiments show that the techniques we implemented are applicable to real-world database applications, successfully handling a variety of language-integrated queries with good performances. This talk will give an overview of what has been achieved so far (mainly in the context of Julien Lopez' PhD Thesis) and will glimpse at preliminary work that is being done in the context of a collaboration with Oracle Labs. |
Fri, January 8, 2021 10:45 am 12:30 pm | Séminaire @ Lê Thành Dũng (Tito) Nguyễn Title: The planar geometry of first-order string transductions (joint work with Pierre Pradic) Abstract: hal.archives-ouvertes......ument We propose a new machine model recognizing star-free languages, with a geometric flavor. Our starting point is the characterization of regular languages using two-way automata (2DFA). The idea is to take seriously the visual representations found throughout the literature of the behavior of a 2DFA on a word ; by putting a total order on the set of states, one can formally define what it means for such a behavior to be planar, in a sense analogous to the planarity of combinatorial maps. Star-free languages are then exactly the languages recognized by "planar 2DFA". We also show that the corresponding planar transducer model characterizes the class of first-order transductions (a.k.a. aperiodic regular functions). If time allows, the talk will briefly discuss the connections of this work with the non-commutative lambda-calculus (cf. our recent paper Aperiodicity in a non-commutative logic, ICALP'20). |
Thu, December 17, 2020 2:00 pm 4:00 pm | Nofar Carmeli Speaker: Nofar Carmeli (nofar.carme.li/) Zoom link: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 Title: The Complexity of Answering Unions of Conjunctive Queries. Abstract: We discuss the fine-grained complexity of enumerating the answers to a query over a relational database. With the ideal guarantees, linear time is required before the first answer to read the input and determine its existence, and then we need to print the answers one by one. Consequently, we wish to identify the queries that can be solved with linear preprocessing time and constant or logarithmic delay between answers. A known dichotomy classifies CQs into those that admit such enumeration and those that do not. The computationally expensive component of query answering is joining tables, which can be done efficiently if and only if the join query is acyclic. However, the join query usually does not appear in a vacuum; for example, it may be part of a larger query, or it may be applied to a database with dependencies. We inspect how the complexity changes in these settings and chart the borders of tractability within. In addition, we consider the task of enumerating query answers with a uniformly random order, and we propose to do so using an efficient random-access structure for representing the set of answers. We also prove conditional lower bounds showing that our algorithms capture all tractable queries in some cases. Among our results, we show that a union of tractable conjunctive queries may be intractable w.r.t. random access; on the other hand, a union of intractable conjunctive queries may be tractable w.r.t. enumeration. |
Fri, December 11, 2020 10:00 am 11:30 am | Alexandre Vigny Title: Elimination Distance to Bounded Degree on Planar Graphs Link to the zoominar: univ-lille-fr.zoom.us/j/95419000064 Abstract: What does it mean for a graph to almost be planar? Or to almost have bounded degree? On such simple graphs classes, some difficult algorithmic problems become tractable. Ideally, one would like to use (or adapt) existing algorithms for graphs that are "almost" in such a simple class. In this talk, I will discuss the notion of elimination distance to a class C, a notion introduced by Bulian and Dawar (2016). The goals of the talk are: 1) Define this notion, and discuss why it is relevant by presenting some existing results. 2) Show that we can compute the elimination distance of a given planar graph to the class of graph of degree at most d. I.e. answer the question: "Is this graph close to a graph of bounded degree?" The second part is the result of a collaboration with Alexandre Lindermayer and Sebastian Siebertz. |
Fri, December 4, 2020 10:00 am 11:00 am | Seminar: Pierre Pradic Title: Extracting nested relational queries from implicit definitions Abstract: arxiv.org/pdf/2005.06503.pdf In this talk, I will present results obtained jointly with Michael Benedikt establishing a connection between the Nested Relational Calculus (NRC) and sets implicitly definable using Δ₀ formulas. Call a formula φ(I,O) an implicit definition of the relation O(x,...) in terms of I(y,...) if O is functionally determined by I: for every I, O, O', if both φ(I,O) and φ(I,O') hold, then we have O ≡ O'. When φ is first-order and I and O are relations over base sorts, then Beth's definability theorem states that there is a first-order formula ψ(I,x,...) corresponding to O whenever φ(I,O) holds. Further, this explicit definition ψ can be effectively be computed from a sequent calculus proof witnessing that φ is functional. This allows for practical use of implicit definitions in the context of database programming, as there is a well-established link between fragments of explicitly FO definable relations and relational calculi. NRC is a conservative extension of relational calculi from database theory with limited powerset types in addition to tupling and anonymous base types. NRC expressions thus not only encompass flat relations over primitive datatypes like SQL but also nested collections, while remaining useful in practice. We extend the above correspondence between first-order logic and flat relational queries to NRC and implicit definitions using set-theoretical Δ₀ formulas over (typed) nested collection. Our proof of the equivalence goes through a notion of Δ₀-interpretation and a generalization of Beth definability for multi-sorted structures. This proof is non-constructive and thus does not yield any useful algorithm for converting implicit definitions into NRC terms. Using an approach more closely related to proof-theoretic interpolation, we give a constructive proof of the result restricted to intuitionistic provability, i.e, when the input functionality proof π of φ(I,O) is carried out in intuitionistic logic. Further, if π is cut-free, this can be done efficiently. Whether or not there exists a polynomial-time procedure working with classical proofs of functionality is still an open problem. I will focus on the effective result for the talk, and if time allows, discuss the difficulties with extending it to classical logic. I will not assume any background in either database or model theory. |
Fri, November 27, 2020 10:00 am 11:30 am | Seminar: Charles Paperman Title: Stackless processing of streamed trees Abstract: In this talk, I will first present the state of the art of efficiency implementation of streaming-text algorithms on modern architecture. Then some recent results on the extraction of information on streamed of structured documents without stack overhead. For more info: paperman.name/data/pub.....d.pdf |
Fri, November 13, 2020 10:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar: Mikaël Monet Title: The Complexity of Counting Problems over Incomplete Databases Abstract: In this presentation, I will talk about various counting problems that naturally arise in the context of query evaluation over incomplete databases. Incomplete databases are relational databases that can contain unknown values in the form of labeled nulls. We will assume that the domains of these unknown values are finite and, for a Boolean query $q$, we will consider the following two problems: given as input an incomplete database $D$, (a) return the number of completions of $D$ that satisfy $q$; or (b) return or the number of valuations of the nulls of $D$ yielding a completion that satisfies $q$. We will study the computational complexity of these problems when $q$ is a self-join--free conjunctive query, and study the impact on the complexity of the following two restrictions: (1) every null occurs at most once in $D$ (what is called *Codd tables*); and (2) the domain of each null is the same. Roughly speaking, we will see that counting completions is much harder than counting valuations, and that both (1) and (2) can reduce the complexity of our problems. I will also talk about the approximability of these problems and prove that, while counting valuations can efficiently be approximated, in most cases counting completions cannot. On our way, we will encounter the counting complexity classes #P, Span-P and Span-L. The presentation will be based on joint work with Marcelo Arenas and Pablo Barcelo; see arxiv.org/abs/1912.11064 |
Fri, October 16, 2020 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Seminar: Aurélien Lemay Title: ShEx Learning from Typed Graphs Abstract: In knowledge graphs, schemas are becoming a new asset to describe the organization of data. The new world-leading format Shex is becoming a de-facto standard in the industry that allows defining flexible and powerful schemas. In this context, the inference of schemas can become a solution to provide shex expressions that describe already existing data. Typically, the inference starts from untyped graphs. However, these tasks appears to be more complex than expected in general, and is possible only for subclasses of Shex. The inference of schemas from typed graph gives a baseline for those algorithms. Its comprehension allows to understand better the underlying difficulties of the task. It presents already unexpected difficulties. We present an algorithm that infers Shex-defined schemas from fully typed graphs. We also present some encountered difficulties, as well as the limitations of the approach. |
Fri, July 24, 2020 2:30 pm 4:30 pm | Momar Sakho, PhD defense |
Wed, January 8, 2020 1:30 pm 3:30 pm | Introduction to argumentation theory Salle Agora 1, Bâtiment ESPRIT |
Thu, December 19, 2019 11:00 am 1:30 pm | Thèse L. Gallois amphi Bâtiment B Inria |
Fri, December 13, 2019 11:45 am 1:00 pm | 1. On Parsing Gpath (Jérémy and Antonio) 2. On Nested Regular Expression (Joachim) |
Fri, December 13, 2019 10:30 am 11:45 am | Repet Lily pour l'équipe "Lille-Salle B31 " |
Tue, September 24, 2019 10:00 am 11:00 am | Stijn Vansummeren Title: General Dynamic Yannakakis: Conjunctive Queries with Theta Joins Under Updates Abstract: The ability to efficiently analyze changing data is a key requirement of many real-time analytics applications like Stream Processing, Complex Event Recognition, Business Intelligence, and Machine Learning. Traditional approaches to this problem are based either on the materialization of subresults (to avoid their recomputation) or on the recomputation of subresults (to avoid the space overhead of materialization). Both techniques have recently been shown suboptimal: instead of fully materializing results and subresults, one can maintain a data structure that supports efficient maintenance under updates and can quickly enumerate the full query output, as well as the changes produced under single updates. In our work we are concerned with designing a practical family of algorithms for dynamic query evaluation based on this idea, and for queries featuring both equi-joins and inequality joins, as well as certain forms of aggregation. Our main insight is that, for acyclic conjunctive queries, such algorithms can naturally be obtained by modifying Yannakakis' seminal algorithm for processing acyclic joins in the static setting. In this talk I present the main ideas behind this modfication, offset it against the traditional ways of doing incremental view maintenance, and discuss recent extensions such as dealing with general theta-joins. Amphitheater of INRIA Building B. |
Tue, June 25, 2019 11:30 am 5:30 pm | Happy Hours Inria Lille |
Tue, June 25, 2019 10:30 am 11:30 am | Seminar Véronique Benzaken and Évelyne Contejean Elles présenteront un outil qui prend en entrée une requête SQL et sa compilation par Postrgres sous forme de plan d'exécution, et démontre (avec Coq) que la requête initiale est équivalente au plan d'exécution. Lille-Salle B21 |
Fri, June 21, 2019 11:00 am 12:00 pm | Charles |