The Covering Problem in Rosenbloom-Tsfasman Spaces

Abstract

We investigate the covering problem in RT spaces induced by the Rosenbloom-Tsfasman metric, extending the classical covering problem in Hamming spaces. Some connections between coverings in RT spaces and coverings in Hamming spaces are derived. Several lower and upper bounds are established for the smallest cardinality of a covering code in an RT space, generalizing results by Carnielli, Chen and Honkala, Brualdi et al., Yildiz et al. A new construction of MDS codes in RT spaces is obtained. Upper bounds are given on the basis of MDS codes, generalizing well-known results due to Stanton et al., Blokhuis and Lam, and Carnielli. Tables of lower and upper bounds are presented too.