Order Optimal Information Spreading Using Algebraic Gossip

Abstract: In this paper we study gossip based information spreading with bounded message sizes. We use algebraic gossip to disseminate $k$ distinct messages to all $n$ nodes in a network. For arbitrary networks we provide a new upper bound for uniform algebraic gossip of $O((k+\log n + D)\Delta)$ rounds with high probability, where $D$ and $\Delta$ are the diameter and the maximum degree in the network, respectively. For many topologies and selections of $k$ this bound improves previous results, in particular, for graphs with a constant maximum degree it implies that uniform gossip is \emph{order optimal} and the stopping time is $\Theta(k + D)$. To eliminate the factor of $\Delta$ from the upper bound we propose a non-uniform gossip protocol, TAG, which is based on algebraic gossip and an arbitrary spanning tree protocol $\S$. The stopping time of TAG is $O(k+\log n +d(\S)+t(\S))$, where $t(\S)$ is the stopping time of the spanning tree protocol, and $d(\S)$ is the diameter of the spanning tree. We provide two general cases in which this bound leads to an order optimal protocol. The first is for $k=\Omega(n)$, where, using a simple gossip broadcast protocol that creates a spanning tree in at most linear time, we show that TAG finishes after $\Theta(n)$ rounds for any graph. The second uses a sophisticated, recent gossip protocol to build a fast spanning tree on graphs with large weak conductance. In turn, this leads to the optimally of TAG on these graphs for $k=\Omega(\mathrm{polylog}(n))$. The technique used in our proofs relies on queuing theory, which is an interesting approach that can be useful in future gossip analysis.