2,332 research outputs found
OSQP: An Operator Splitting Solver for Quadratic Programs
We present a general-purpose solver for convex quadratic programs based on
the alternating direction method of multipliers, employing a novel operator
splitting technique that requires the solution of a quasi-definite linear
system with the same coefficient matrix at almost every iteration. Our
algorithm is very robust, placing no requirements on the problem data such as
positive definiteness of the objective function or linear independence of the
constraint functions. It can be configured to be division-free once an initial
matrix factorization is carried out, making it suitable for real-time
applications in embedded systems. In addition, our technique is the first
operator splitting method for quadratic programs able to reliably detect primal
and dual infeasible problems from the algorithm iterates. The method also
supports factorization caching and warm starting, making it particularly
efficient when solving parametrized problems arising in finance, control, and
machine learning. Our open-source C implementation OSQP has a small footprint,
is library-free, and has been extensively tested on many problem instances from
a wide variety of application areas. It is typically ten times faster than
competing interior-point methods, and sometimes much more when factorization
caching or warm start is used. OSQP has already shown a large impact with tens
of thousands of users both in academia and in large corporations
On linear convergence of a distributed dual gradient algorithm for linearly constrained separable convex problems
In this paper we propose a distributed dual gradient algorithm for minimizing
linearly constrained separable convex problems and analyze its rate of
convergence. In particular, we prove that under the assumption of strong
convexity and Lipshitz continuity of the gradient of the primal objective
function we have a global error bound type property for the dual problem. Using
this error bound property we devise a fully distributed dual gradient scheme,
i.e. a gradient scheme based on a weighted step size, for which we derive
global linear rate of convergence for both dual and primal suboptimality and
for primal feasibility violation. Many real applications, e.g. distributed
model predictive control, network utility maximization or optimal power flow,
can be posed as linearly constrained separable convex problems for which dual
gradient type methods from literature have sublinear convergence rate. In the
present paper we prove for the first time that in fact we can achieve linear
convergence rate for such algorithms when they are used for solving these
applications. Numerical simulations are also provided to confirm our theory.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures, submitted to Automatica Journal, February 2014.
arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1401.4398. We revised
the paper, adding more simulations and checking for typo
Sequential Convex Programming Methods for Solving Nonlinear Optimization Problems with DC constraints
This paper investigates the relation between sequential convex programming
(SCP) as, e.g., defined in [24] and DC (difference of two convex functions)
programming. We first present an SCP algorithm for solving nonlinear
optimization problems with DC constraints and prove its convergence. Then we
combine the proposed algorithm with a relaxation technique to handle
inconsistent linearizations. Numerical tests are performed to investigate the
behaviour of the class of algorithms.Comment: 18 pages, 1 figur
Successive Convexification of Non-Convex Optimal Control Problems and Its Convergence Properties
This paper presents an algorithm to solve non-convex optimal control
problems, where non-convexity can arise from nonlinear dynamics, and non-convex
state and control constraints. This paper assumes that the state and control
constraints are already convex or convexified, the proposed algorithm
convexifies the nonlinear dynamics, via a linearization, in a successive
manner. Thus at each succession, a convex optimal control subproblem is solved.
Since the dynamics are linearized and other constraints are convex, after a
discretization, the subproblem can be expressed as a finite dimensional convex
programming subproblem. Since convex optimization problems can be solved very
efficiently, especially with custom solvers, this subproblem can be solved in
time-critical applications, such as real-time path planning for autonomous
vehicles. Several safe-guarding techniques are incorporated into the algorithm,
namely virtual control and trust regions, which add another layer of
algorithmic robustness. A convergence analysis is presented in continuous- time
setting. By doing so, our convergence results will be independent from any
numerical schemes used for discretization. Numerical simulations are performed
for an illustrative trajectory optimization example.Comment: Updates: corrected wordings for LICQ. This is the full version. A
brief version of this paper is published in 2016 IEEE 55th Conference on
Decision and Control (CDC). http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/7798816
Self-adaptive fitness formulation for constrained optimization
A self-adaptive fitness formulation is presented for
solving constrained optimization problems. In this method, the dimensionality
of the problem is reduced by representing the constraint
violations by a single infeasibility measure. The infeasibility
measure is used to form a two-stage penalty that is applied to the
infeasible solutions. The performance of the method has been examined
by its application to a set of eleven test cases from the specialized
literature. The results have been compared with previously
published results from the literature. It is shown that the method
is able to find the optimum solutions. The proposed method requires
no parameter tuning and can be used as a fitness evaluator
with any evolutionary algorithm. The approach is also robust in
its handling of both linear and nonlinear equality and inequality
constraint functions. Furthermore, the method does not require an
initial feasible solution
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