Necklaces, convolutions, and X + Y

We give subquadratic algorithms that, given two necklaces each with n beads at arbitrary positions, compute the optimal rotation of the necklaces to best align the beads. Here alignment is measured according to the ℓ_p norm of the vector of distances between pairs of beads from opposite necklaces in the best perfect matching. We show surprisingly different results for p = 1, p = 2, and p = ∞. For p = 2, we reduce the problem to standard convolution, while for p = ∞ and p = 1, we reduce the problem to (min,+) convolution and (median, +) convolution. Then we solve the latter two convolution problems in subquadratic time, which are interesting results in their own right. These results shed some light on the classic sorting X + Y problem, because the convolutions can be viewed as computing order statistics on the antidiagonals of the X + Y matrix. All of our algorithms run in o(n ²) time, whereas the obvious algorithms for these problems run in ⊖(n²) time.