Parity automaton

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A parity automaton is a variant of a finite state automaton that accepts infinite inputs. Unlike usual finite state automata, there is no set of final states; instead, each state is assigned a natural number. It accepts an infinite input sequence if and only if there exists a run of the automaton (in case of a deterministic automaton, there is exactly one possible run) that satisfies the parity condition: the largest number occurring infinitely often is even.

Parity automata are generalizations of Büchi automata. Streett, Rabin, and Muller automata are generalizations of parity automata.