Fully-Dynamic and Kinetic Conflict-Free Coloring of Intervals with Respect to Points

Abstract

We introduce the fully-dynamic conflict-free coloring problem for a set $S$ of intervals in $\mathbb{R}^1$ with respect to points, where the goal is to maintain a conflict-free coloring for$S$ under insertions and deletions. A coloring is conflict-free if for each point $p$ contained in some interval, $p$ is contained in an interval whose color is not shared with any other interval containing $p$. We investigate trade-offs between the number of colors used and the number of intervals that are recolored upon insertion or deletion of an interval. Our results include: - a lower bound on the number of recolorings as a function of the number of colors, which implies that with $O(1)$ recolorings per update the worst-case number of colors is $\Omega(\log n/\log\log n)$, and that any strategy using $O(1/\varepsilon)$ colors needs $\Omega(\varepsilon n^{\varepsilon})$ recolorings; - a coloring strategy that uses $O(\log n)$ colors at the cost of $O(\log n)$ recolorings, and another strategy that uses $O(1/\varepsilon)$ colors at the cost of $O(n^{\varepsilon}/\varepsilon)$ recolorings; - stronger upper and lower bounds for special cases. We also consider the kinetic setting where the intervals move continuously (but there are no insertions or deletions); here we show how to maintain a coloring with only four colors at the cost of three recolorings per event and show this is tight.