Basic Terminologies

1. Alphabet () : A finite, non-empty set of symbols.

Eg.,
{0,1 } is a binary alphabet.
{ A, B, , Z, a, b, , z } is an English alphabet.

2. String (over an alphabet ) : Finite sequence of any

number of symbols from .
Eg., 0, 1, 11, 00, and 01101 are strings over {0, 1 }.
Cat, CAT, and compute are strings over the English alphabet.

3. We use a,b,c,0,1, for alphabets &u,v,w,for strings.

Eg., u = abab and v = 0100

4. Contatenation of two strings u and v (uv): Appending

the symbols (alphabets) of v to the right end of w.
Eg., uv = abab0100.

5. Reverse of a string : Writing the symbols in reverse order

Eg., uR = baba and vR = 0010. Remember: u = abab; v = 0100

6. Length of a string (|u|): Number of symbols in the string.

7. Empty string (): A string with no symbols. So | | = 0.
8. Let w be a string. wn means repeating w, n times.
Eg., w = 10. Then w2 = 1010, w3 = 101010. So w1 = w and w0 =

9. Let be an alphabet. Set of all strings that can be

formed from the alphabets of is denoted by *. It
contains .
+ = *- {}.
Any subset of * is called a language L.

Operations on languages

Language L is a set of strings over an alphabet .

Complement : L = * - L
Reverse : LR = { wR : w L}
Concatenation : L1L2 = {xy : x L1, y L2}
Ln = L concatenated with itself n times
L0 = {} and L1 = L.
Star-closure
L* = L0 U L1 U (Kleene closure)
Positive-closure L+ = L1 U L2 U

Example: L = {anbn : n >0}. Then L2 = {anbn ambm: n,m >0} and LR =

{bnan : n > 0}. Hard to describe L and L*.

More Examples

= {0,1} and L = {0w : w {0,1}*}

L* =
L=
LR =
= {0,1} and L = {w : w {0,1}* and |w| is even}
L* =
L=
LR =

Finite Automaton
A finite automaton can be thought of as a device
consisting of a tape and a control circuit which satisfy
the following conditions:
1.The tape has the left end and extends to the right
without an end.
2.The tape is divide into squares in each of which a
symbol can be written prior to the start of the operation
of the automaton.
3.The tape has a read only head.
4.The head is always at the leftmost square at the
beginning of the operation.
5.The head moves to the right one square every time it
reads a symbol.
It never moves to the left. When it sees no symbol, it
stops and the automaton terminates its operation.
6.There is a finite control which determines the state of
the automaton and also controls the movement of the
head.

Pushdown Automaton

Pushdown automata differ from

finite automata in two ways:

They can use the top of the

stack to decide which transition
to take.
They can manipulate the stack
as part of performing a
transition.

Finite state machines just look at

the input signal and the current
state: they have no stack to work
with. Pushdown automata add
the stack as a parameter for
choice.
Pushdown automata choose a
transition state using input
signal, current state, and the
symbol at the top of the stack.

Turing Machine

(Turing 1948, p. 61)

TM has infinite memory capacity
obtained in the form of an infinite
tape, marked out into squares.
Symbol is printed on each square.
Read/Write head is in one state and
points to one symbol in the tape
(called the scanned symbol).
The machine can alter the scanned
symbol but the symbols on the tape
elsewhere do not affect the
behaviour of the machine.
The tape can be moved left and right
through the machine.
Any symbol on the tape may
therefore eventually have an innings.

2012 has been officially declared Alan

Turing Year to celebrate Turing's
contributions to the art of computer
science, computing, artificial
intelligence, developmental biology,
and the mathematical theory of
computability on the centenary of his
birth.