When Is the Normalized Edit Distance over Non-Uniform Weights a Metric?

Dana Fisman, Ilay Tzarfati

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

Abstract

The well known Normalized Edit Distance (ned) [Marzal and Vidal 1993] is known to disobey the triangle inequality on contrived weight functions, while in practice it often exhibits a triangular behavior. Let d be a weight function on basic edit operations, and let nedd be the resulting normalized edit distance. The question what criteria should d satisfy for nedd to be a metric is long standing. It was recently shown that when d is the uniform weight function (all operations cost 1 except for no-op which costs 0) then nedd is a metric. The question regarding non-uniform weights remained open. In this paper we answer this question by providing a necessary and sufficient condition on d under which nedd is a metric.

Original languageAmerican English
Title of host publication35th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching, CPM 2024
EditorsShunsuke Inenaga, Simon J. Puglisi
PublisherSchloss Dagstuhl- Leibniz-Zentrum fur Informatik GmbH, Dagstuhl Publishing
ISBN (Electronic)9783959773263
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jun 2024
Event35th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching, CPM 2024 - Fukuoka, Japan
Duration: 25 Jun 202427 Jun 2024

Publication series

NameLeibniz International Proceedings in Informatics, LIPIcs
Volume296

Conference

Conference35th Annual Symposium on Combinatorial Pattern Matching, CPM 2024
Country/TerritoryJapan
CityFukuoka
Period25/06/2427/06/24

Keywords

  • Metric
  • Non-uniform Weights
  • Normalized Edit Distance
  • Triangle Inequality

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Software

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