5CCS2FC2: Foundations of Computing II

Tutorial Sheet 7

Some problems that are undecidable for Turing Machines are decidable for simpler computa-
tional models such as DFAs. In what follows let code(A) denote the code of a given DFA A,
constructed in the same was of for Turing Machines.
7.1 Show that the Emptiness problem for DFAs is decidable by constructing a sound, complete
and terminating algorithm for the following language

EDF A = code(A) : A is a DFA such that Language(A) = ∅
In other words, EDF A is the language of all DFAs that do not accept any words (including
the empty string ε). (Hint: Think about how you might establish whether or not a DFA
accepted any words from looking at it’s state diagram?)

7.2 [Tricky!] Show that the Equivalance problem for DFAs is decidable by constructing a sound,
complete and terminating algorithm for the following language

EQDF A = hcode(A), code(B)i : Language(A) = Language(B)
where A and B are DFAs. In other words, EQDF A is the language of all pairs of DFAs that
accept exactly the same words. (Hint: Can you construct a machine that accepts only
those words that are accepted by one machine but not the other?)

7.3 Show that the Accepting problem for Turing machines AT M is undecidable using the proof-
by-contradiction approach, where

AT M = hcode(M ), wi : M is a TM that accepts w .

7.4 Show that the Rejecting problem for Turing machines RT M is undecidable using the proof-
by-contradiction approach, where

RT M = hcode(M ), wi : M is a TM that rejects w .

7.5 [Tricky!] Show that the Finite space problem for Turing Machines FinSpaceT M is unde-
cidable using the proof-by-contradiction approach, where

FinSpaceT M = hcode(M ), wi : M visits only finitely many tape cells on input w .
Note that all terminating computations necessarily visit only finitely many tape cells, but so
do many non-halting computations which may just move backwards and forwards over the
same part of the tape.