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Questions tagged [turing-machines]

A Turing machine is an idealized model of computation consisting of a finite-state control, an infinite tape holding information, and a read head positioned somewhere over the tape. Turing machines are used in computability theory to reason about the limits of computation, to provide a formal definition for an algorithm, and to provide formal models for nondeterminism.

Wiki

A Turing machine is a device that manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules. Despite its simplicity, a Turing machine can be adapted to simulate the logic of any computer algorithm, and is particularly useful in explaining the functions of a CPU inside a computer.

Turing machines are not physical objects but mathematical ones. A Turing machine is a kind of state machine. At any time the machine is in any one of a finite number of states. Instructions for a Turing machine consist in specified conditions under which the machine will transition between one state and another.

The tape is used to store data. In addition, it can also store a series of transitions (a small programs) and thus, the head can run sub-programs. By analogy with modern computers, the tape is the memory and the head is the microprocessor.

Tag usage

The tag can be used for programming related problems in implementing features of a turing machine. The tag can also be used for algorithmic problems related to turing machine. Try to avoid theoretical and research based questions on Stack Overflow.

Please note https://cstheory.stackexchange.com is another stack exchange website which you can use to ask theoretical and conceptual problems with tag

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Which Turing machine extensions broaden the power of the machine?

Of all the Turing machine extensions there are (such as two-way infinite tape, RAM, multiple read/write heads, and nondeterminism), do any of them allow the TM to decide problems that were previously undecidable?
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Is there any easy way of solving "Construct a Turing machine ..." questions?

I understood the logic of Turing machine. When the Turing machine is given , i can understand how it is working and how it halts. But when it is asked to construct a Turing machine , it is more difficult. Is there any easy way to find the answer…
oiyio
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Reduction from Atm to A (of my choice) , and from A to Atm

Reduction of many one , is not symmetric . I'm trying to prove it but it doesn't work so well . Given two languages A and B ,where A is defined as A={w| |w| is even} , i.e. `w` has an even length and B=A_TM , where A_TM is undecidable but…
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Is it possible to do graphics programming in AWK?

I guess this is a question about what it means to be Turing complete. Awk is a programming language, and I've heard you can do anything with those, but aren't there physical limitations as well? I mean, you probably can't delete files with a…
Ziggy
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Context sensitive language with non deterministic turing machine

how can i show a language is context sensitive with a non deterministic turing machine? i know that a language that is accepted by a Linear bound automaton (LBA ) is a context -sensitive language. And a LBA is a non-deterministic turing machine. Any…
user1004413
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Is the busy beaver function unique for an n-state busy beaver game?

For a given n-state busy beaver game, is the busy beaver function unique, or might there be multiple functions with the same maximum score? Perhaps it has not been proven either way?
Daniel
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Turing machine to solve a^(0+1+2+3+....+n)

Can anyone give me some insight how that Turing machine can be implemented? L = Xa^n n >= 0 and n = 0 + 1 + 2 + 3 +....+ M accepted examples: Xa ->(0+1) Xaaa -> (0+1+2) Xaaaaaa (0+1+2+3) etc. I couldn't find any source on the…
Ugur Kellecioglu
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Turing Machine Algorithm

Could you please help me? I need to write code for a one-tape Turing Machine that uses the following two-letter alphabet a and b. So the programme should show the common prefix of the two words. For example: g(aab,aaaba) -> aa; g(_,abab) -> _; …
LgScr
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Chomsky Hierarchy and Robot Framework

I am writing a thesis about Robot Framework. I would like include a part about Chomsky Hierarchy, and describe in which hierarchy, does it belong to. As far as i can understand it, most programming languages can be described by CFG (Context Free…
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What is the difference between a Turing Machine and an Algorithm?

According to my understanding, the Turing machine is just a machine representation of an algorithm. Is there any difference between an algorithm and a Turing machine?
Obaid Ur Rehman
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Is there an online/standalone Computer Simulator / Demo program?

I would like to be able to give students an awareness of exactly what happens during program execution inside a modern computer - e.g. use of memory addresses, references, stack, heap and so on. Ideally I'd like for them to be able to play with some…
immutabl
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Turing Machine and Ciphers

I am looking into Turing machines and am trying to work out how I could describe some basic cryptography algorithms (Caesar cipher for example) using Turing machines. Consider: F={x#y|x,y∈{a,b,c,d,e,f}∗,y is equal to x with a Caesar shift of…
user6089076
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Can a PDA with two stacks accept RE Language?

So, I was having a bit of difficulty figuring what exactly is meant by a String on which Turing Machine does not halt. I read somewhere that a Turing Machine is equivalent to a deterministic automata with 2 stacks. But how will a deterministic…
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Turing machine to calculate sum of 2 binary numbers

How can I build a Turing machine to calculate the sum of 2 binaries numbers given X$Y* for input? For example, suppose X = 3 and Y = 5. The input for the machine will be #011$101*#. The state in the end should be #1000#. We can assume X and Y have…
Yonatan Nissan
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State Diagram for Turing Machine to compute next string in lexicographical order

What would the state diagram look like for a Turing Machine that computes the next string in lexicographical order over alphabet Σ = {1, 2, 3}? String size is 4, i.e ---1, ---2, ---3, --11, --12, etc... Already tried figuring it out from Michael…
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