Disjunctive normal form

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In boolean logic, a disjunctive normal form (DNF) is a standardization (or normalization) of a logical formula
which is a disjunction of conjunctive clauses; it can also be described as an OR of ANDs, a sum of products, or (in
philosophical logic) a cluster concept. As a normal form, it is useful in automated theorem proving.

1 Denition
A logical formula is considered to be in DNF if and only if it is a disjunction of one or more conjunctions of one or
more literals.[1]:153 A DNF formula is in full disjunctive normal form if each of its variables appears exactly once
in every clause. As in conjunctive normal form (CNF), the only propositional operators in DNF are and, or, and not.
The not operator can only be used as part of a literal, which means that it can only precede a propositional variable.
The following is a formal grammar for DNF:

1. disjunction (conjunction disjunction)

2. disjunction conjunction

3. conjunction (literal conjunction)

4. conjunction literal

5. literal variable

6. literal variable

Where variable is any variable.

For example, all of the following formulae are in DNF:

(A B C) (D E F )

(A B) C

AB

However, the following formulae are not in DNF:

(A B) , since an OR is nested within a NOT

A (B (C D)) , since an OR is nested within an AND

1
2 2 CONVERSION TO DNF

AB
CD 00 01 11 10

10 1 1
11 1 1
01 1 1
00 1 1
Karnaugh map of the disjunctive normal form (ABD) (ABC) (ABD) (ABC)

2 Conversion to DNF

Converting a formula to DNF involves using logical equivalences, such as the double negative elimination, De Mor-
gans laws, and the distributive law.
All logical formulas can be converted into an equivalent disjunctive normal form.[1]:152-153 However, in some cases
conversion to DNF can lead to an exponential explosion of the formula. For example, the DNF of a logical formula
of the following form has 2n terms:

(X1 Y1 ) (X2 Y2 ) (Xn Yn )

Any particular Boolean function can be represented by one and only one[note 1] full disjunctive normal form, one of
the canonical forms. In contrast, two dierent plain disjunctive normal forms may denote the same Boolean function,
see pictures.
 3

AB
CD 00 01 11 10

10 1 1
11 1 1
01 1 1
00 1 1
Karnaugh map of the disjunctive normal form (ACD) (BCD) (ACD) (BCD). Despite the dierent
grouping, the same elds contain a 1 as in the previous map.

3 Complexity issues
An important variation used in the study of computational complexity is k-DNF. A formula is in k-DNF if it is in
DNF and each clause contains at most k literals. Dually to CNFs, the problem of deciding whether a given DNF is
true for every variable assignment is NP-complete, the same holds if only k-DNFs are considered.

4 See also
Algebraic normal form

Boolean function

Boolean-valued function

Conjunctive normal form

Horn clause
4 7 EXTERNAL LINKS

Karnaugh map

Logical graph
Propositional logic

QuineMcCluskey algorithm
Truth table

5 Notes
[1] Ignoring variations based on associativity and commutativity of AND and OR.

6 References
[1] B.A. Davey and H.A. Priestley (1990). Introduction to Lattices and Order. Cambridge Mathematical Textbooks. Cambridge
University Press.

7 External links
Hazewinkel, Michiel, ed. (2001) [1994], Disjunctive normal form, Encyclopedia of Mathematics, Springer
Science+Business Media B.V. / Kluwer Academic Publishers, ISBN 978-1-55608-010-4
 5

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