George KhayatSoftware Engineer
← The ArchiveGK-005 — archive file

GK-005 · Academic · Algorithms

DFA Minimization

Hopcroft's algorithm, made visible

An interactive visualization of Hopcroft's DFA minimization algorithm that lets you observe partition refinement step by step.

Year
—
Status
Complete
Context
Theory of Computation coursework
Stack
C++ · Qt
Links
Repository ↗
01

Problem

A Theory of Computation course required implementing DFA minimization — and most implementations are black boxes that never show the algorithm working.

02

What was built

A C++ GUI application that visualizes each partition-refinement step of Hopcroft's algorithm, so you can trace exactly how the automaton gets minimized.

03

System

each splitExternalInput DFAProcessHopcroft refinementClientStep visualizerDataMinimal DFA
Hover or tab through the nodes to trace each pathway.
  1. Stage 01
    • Input DFAStates, alphabet, transitions, accepting set
  2. Stage 02
    • Hopcroft refinementSplit partitions by distinguishing transitions
  3. Stage 03
    • Step visualizerC++ · Qt GUI
  4. Stage 04
    • Minimal DFAOne state per equivalence class
Automaton in → refinement steps → minimal automaton out
04

Technical decisions

  1. D01

    Show the refinement, not just the result

    Every split of the partition is a visible step, so the reason two states end up merged is always inspectable.

  2. D02

    Native GUI

    Written in C++ with a Qt interface.

05

Try it

LAB-06 — live in the LabDFA Minimization →A web re-implementation of GK-005: step through Hopcroft's partition refinement and watch equivalent states merge.