2,437 research outputs found
Coarse-to-Fine Lifted MAP Inference in Computer Vision
There is a vast body of theoretical research on lifted inference in
probabilistic graphical models (PGMs). However, few demonstrations exist where
lifting is applied in conjunction with top of the line applied algorithms. We
pursue the applicability of lifted inference for computer vision (CV), with the
insight that a globally optimal (MAP) labeling will likely have the same label
for two symmetric pixels. The success of our approach lies in efficiently
handling a distinct unary potential on every node (pixel), typical of CV
applications. This allows us to lift the large class of algorithms that model a
CV problem via PGM inference. We propose a generic template for coarse-to-fine
(C2F) inference in CV, which progressively refines an initial coarsely lifted
PGM for varying quality-time trade-offs. We demonstrate the performance of C2F
inference by developing lifted versions of two near state-of-the-art CV
algorithms for stereo vision and interactive image segmentation. We find that,
against flat algorithms, the lifted versions have a much superior anytime
performance, without any loss in final solution quality.Comment: Published in IJCAI 201
MonetDB/XQuery: a fast XQuery processor powered by a relational engine
Relational XQuery systems try to re-use mature relational data management infrastructures to create fast and scalable XML database technology. This paper describes the main features, key contributions, and lessons learned while implementing such a system. Its architecture consists of (i) a range-based encoding of XML documents into relational tables, (ii) a compilation technique that translates XQuery into a basic relational algebra, (iii) a restricted (order) property-aware peephole relational query optimization strategy, and (iv) a mapping from XML update statements into relational updates. Thus, this system implements all essential XML database functionalities (rather than a single feature) such that we can learn from the full consequences of our architectural decisions. While implementing this system, we had to extend the state-of-the-art with a number of new technical contributions, such as loop-lifted staircase join and efficient relational query evaluation strategies for XQuery theta-joins with existential semantics. These contributions as well as the architectural lessons learned are also deemed valuable for other relational back-end engines. The performance and scalability of the resulting system is evaluated on the XMark benchmark up to data sizes of 11GB. The performance section also provides an extensive benchmark comparison of all major XMark results published previously, which confirm that the goal of purely relational XQuery processing, namely speed and scalability, was met
Combinatorial persistency criteria for multicut and max-cut
In combinatorial optimization, partial variable assignments are called
persistent if they agree with some optimal solution. We propose persistency
criteria for the multicut and max-cut problem as well as fast combinatorial
routines to verify them. The criteria that we derive are based on mappings that
improve feasible multicuts, respectively cuts. Our elementary criteria can be
checked enumeratively. The more advanced ones rely on fast algorithms for upper
and lower bounds for the respective cut problems and max-flow techniques for
auxiliary min-cut problems. Our methods can be used as a preprocessing
technique for reducing problem sizes or for computing partial optimality
guarantees for solutions output by heuristic solvers. We show the efficacy of
our methods on instances of both problems from computer vision, biomedical
image analysis and statistical physics
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