Visualizing the 3SAT to CLIQUE Reduction Process

Abstract

As the needs of industry and research change, computer science education has gradually begun to incorporate a more intense concentration on theoretical discussions surrounding, among others, automaton theory, NP-Completeness, and reduction theory. These concepts have repeatedly been ranked as some of the most difficult concepts in computer science education by students. This is largely due to the abstract nature of the material along with the perceived lack of industry applicability. In order to bridge this pedagogical gap, this paper showcases a visual tool developed to teach students of computational theory the reduction process. The application allows students to dynamically generate the reduction between 3SAT and CLIQUE. The tool is developed to allow for any 3SAT input. This allows students to explore how changes applied to an instance of one problem impact are reflected in the reduced instance of a second problem. Results are presented and we demonstrate a working implementation of the visualization tool. Further work still needs to be done to expand on intractability and implement additional problems.