Rectilinear-upward planarity testing of digraphs

A rectilinear-upward planar drawing of a digraph G is a crossing-free drawing of G where each edge is either a horizontal or a vertical segment, and such that no directed edge points downward. Rectilinear-Upward Planarity Testing is the problem of deciding whether a digraph G admits a rectilinear-upward planar drawing. We study the complexity of Rectilinear-Upward Planarity Testing and provide several algorithmic results. Precisely, we prove that: ( i ) the problem is NP-complete, even if G is biconnected; ( i i ) it can be solved in linear time when an upward planar embedding of G is fixed; ( i i i ) the problem is polynomial-time solvable for biconnected digraphs of treewidth at most two, i.e., for digraphs whose underlying undirected graph is a series-parallel graph; ( i v ) the problem is fixed-parameter tractable (namely, fixed-parameter linear) for all biconnected graphs, when parameterized by the number of sources and sinks in the digraph. • We study the algorithmic complexity of a problem that combines two well-established topics in graph drawing, namely rectilinear planar drawings and upward planar drawings. This problems, called rectilinear-upward planarity testing, asks to decide whether an input planar di-graph admits a planar drawing where each edge is either a horizontal or a vertical segment, and no edge points downwards. • We prove that rectilinear-upward planarity testing is NP-complete, even for biconnected digraphs. • We provide a linear-time algorithm for rectilinear-upward planarity testing of digraphs with a fixed upward planar embedding. • We provide a quadratic-time algorithm for rectilinear-upward planarity testing of biconnected partial 2-trees (i.e., digraphs whose underlying undirected graph is series-parallel) in the variable embedding setting. • We provide a fixed-parameter linear (FPL) algorithm for rectilinear- upward planarity testing of general biconnected digraphs in the variable embedding setting.

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Publication Details

Journal
Journal of Computer and System Sciences
Published
2026-02-03
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcss.2026.103775
Primary Topic
Computational Geometry and Mesh Generation
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
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article

Rectilinear-upward planarity testing of digraphs

Giacomo Ortali, Maurizio Patrignani, Giuseppe Liotta, Michael Kaufmann et al.
Journal of Computer and System Sciences
Computational Geometry and Mesh Generation
article

Rectilinear-upward planarity testing of digraphs

Giacomo Ortali, Maurizio Patrignani, Giuseppe Liotta, Michael Kaufmann, Walter Didimo
article en

Abstract

A rectilinear-upward planar drawing of a digraph G is a crossing-free drawing of G where each edge is either a horizontal or a vertical segment, and such that no directed edge points downward. Rectilinear-Upward Planarity Testing is the problem of deciding whether a digraph G admits a rectilinear-upward planar drawing. We study the complexity of Rectilinear-Upward Planarity Testing and provide several algorithmic results. Precisely, we prove that: ( i ) the problem is NP-complete, even if G is biconnected; ( i i ) it can be solved in linear time when an upward planar embedding of G is fixed; ( i i i ) the problem is polynomial-time solvable for biconnected digraphs of treewidth at most two, i.e., for digraphs whose underlying undirected graph is a series-parallel graph; ( i v ) the problem is fixed-parameter tractable (namely, fixed-parameter linear) for all biconnected graphs, when parameterized by the number of sources and sinks in the digraph. • We study the algorithmic complexity of a problem that combines two well-established topics in graph drawing, namely rectilinear planar drawings and upward planar drawings. This problems, called rectilinear-upward planarity testing, asks to decide whether an input planar di-graph admits a planar drawing where each edge is either a horizontal or a vertical segment, and no edge points downwards. • We prove that rectilinear-upward planarity testing is NP-complete, even for biconnected digraphs. • We provide a linear-time algorithm for rectilinear-upward planarity testing of digraphs with a fixed upward planar embedding. • We provide a quadratic-time algorithm for rectilinear-upward planarity testing of biconnected partial 2-trees (i.e., digraphs whose underlying undirected graph is series-parallel) in the variable embedding setting. • We provide a fixed-parameter linear (FPL) algorithm for rectilinear- upward planarity testing of general biconnected digraphs in the variable embedding setting.

Journal of Computer and System SciencesVol. 158
Roma Tre University (IT), University of Perugia (IT), University of Tübingen (DE)
Openalex Percentile: Top 70%
Computational Geometry and Mesh Generation
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