DROPS

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.15

Asynchronous Latency and Fast Atomic Snapshot

Authors: João Paulo Bezerra, Luciano Freitas, Petr Kuznetsov, and Matthieu Rambaud

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 356, 39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025)

Abstract

This paper introduces a novel, fast atomic-snapshot protocol for asynchronous message-passing systems. In the process of defining what "fast" means exactly, we spot a few interesting issues that arise when conventional time metrics are applied to long-lived asynchronous algorithms. We reveal some gaps in latency claims made in earlier work on snapshot algorithms, which hamper their comparative time-complexity analysis. We then come up with a new unifying time-complexity metric that captures the latency of an operation in an asynchronous, long-lived implementation. This allows us to formally grasp latency improvements of our atomic-snapshot algorithm with respect to the state-of-the-art protocols: optimal latency in fault-free runs without contention, short constant latency in fault-free runs with contention, the worst-case latency proportional to the number of active concurrent failures, and constant amortized latency.

Cite as

João Paulo Bezerra, Luciano Freitas, Petr Kuznetsov, and Matthieu Rambaud. Asynchronous Latency and Fast Atomic Snapshot. In 39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 356, pp. 15:1-15:22, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2025)

Copy BibTex To Clipboard

@InProceedings{bezerra_et_al:LIPIcs.DISC.2025.15,
  author =	{Bezerra, Jo\~{a}o Paulo and Freitas, Luciano and Kuznetsov, Petr and Rambaud, Matthieu},
  title =	{{Asynchronous Latency and Fast Atomic Snapshot}},
  booktitle =	{39th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2025)},
  pages =	{15:1--15:22},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-402-4},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2025},
  volume =	{356},
  editor =	{Kowalski, Dariusz R.},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.15},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-248326},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2025.15},
  annote =	{Keywords: Asynchronous systems, time complexity, atomic snapshot, crash faults}
}

Document

DOI: 10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2022.24

Distributed Randomness from Approximate Agreement

Authors: Luciano Freitas, Petr Kuznetsov, and Andrei Tonkikh

Published in: LIPIcs, Volume 246, 36th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2022)

Abstract

Randomisation is a critical tool in designing distributed systems. The common coin primitive, enabling the system members to agree on an unpredictable random number, has proven to be particularly useful. We observe, however, that it is impossible to implement a truly random common coin protocol in a fault-prone asynchronous system. To circumvent this impossibility, we introduce two relaxations of the perfect common coin: (1) approximate common coin generating random numbers that are close to each other; and (2) Monte Carlo common coin generating a common random number with an arbitrarily small, but non-zero, probability of failure. Building atop the approximate agreement primitive, we obtain efficient asynchronous implementations of the two abstractions, tolerating up to one third of Byzantine processes. Our protocols do not assume trusted setup or public key infrastructure and converge to the perfect coin exponentially fast in the protocol running time. By plugging one of our protocols for Monte Carlo common coin in a well-known consensus algorithm, we manage to get a binary Byzantine agreement protocol with O(n³ log n) communication complexity, resilient against an adaptive adversary, and tolerating the optimal number f < n/3 of failures without trusted setup or PKI. To the best of our knowledge, the best communication complexity for binary Byzantine agreement achieved so far in this setting is O(n⁴). We also show how the approximate common coin, combined with a variant of Gray code, can be used to solve an interesting problem of Intersecting Random Subsets, which we introduce in this paper.

Cite as

Luciano Freitas, Petr Kuznetsov, and Andrei Tonkikh. Distributed Randomness from Approximate Agreement. In 36th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2022). Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs), Volume 246, pp. 24:1-24:21, Schloss Dagstuhl – Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik (2022)

Copy BibTex To Clipboard

@InProceedings{freitas_et_al:LIPIcs.DISC.2022.24,
  author =	{Freitas, Luciano and Kuznetsov, Petr and Tonkikh, Andrei},
  title =	{{Distributed Randomness from Approximate Agreement}},
  booktitle =	{36th International Symposium on Distributed Computing (DISC 2022)},
  pages =	{24:1--24:21},
  series =	{Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)},
  ISBN =	{978-3-95977-255-6},
  ISSN =	{1868-8969},
  year =	{2022},
  volume =	{246},
  editor =	{Scheideler, Christian},
  publisher =	{Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik},
  address =	{Dagstuhl, Germany},
  URL =		{https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2022.24},
  URN =		{urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-172157},
  doi =		{10.4230/LIPIcs.DISC.2022.24},
  annote =	{Keywords: Asynchronous, approximate agreement, weak common coin, consensus, Byzantine agreement}
}

Search Results

Documents authored by Freitas, Luciano

Asynchronous Latency and Fast Atomic Snapshot

Abstract

Cite as

Distributed Randomness from Approximate Agreement

Abstract

Cite as

Thanks for your feedback!

Could not send message