30,560 research outputs found
Playing with Duality: An Overview of Recent Primal-Dual Approaches for Solving Large-Scale Optimization Problems
Optimization methods are at the core of many problems in signal/image
processing, computer vision, and machine learning. For a long time, it has been
recognized that looking at the dual of an optimization problem may drastically
simplify its solution. Deriving efficient strategies which jointly brings into
play the primal and the dual problems is however a more recent idea which has
generated many important new contributions in the last years. These novel
developments are grounded on recent advances in convex analysis, discrete
optimization, parallel processing, and non-smooth optimization with emphasis on
sparsity issues. In this paper, we aim at presenting the principles of
primal-dual approaches, while giving an overview of numerical methods which
have been proposed in different contexts. We show the benefits which can be
drawn from primal-dual algorithms both for solving large-scale convex
optimization problems and discrete ones, and we provide various application
examples to illustrate their usefulness
A Computational Comparison of Optimization Methods for the Golomb Ruler Problem
The Golomb ruler problem is defined as follows: Given a positive integer n,
locate n marks on a ruler such that the distance between any two distinct pair
of marks are different from each other and the total length of the ruler is
minimized. The Golomb ruler problem has applications in information theory,
astronomy and communications, and it can be seen as a challenge for
combinatorial optimization algorithms. Although constructing high quality
rulers is well-studied, proving optimality is a far more challenging task. In
this paper, we provide a computational comparison of different optimization
paradigms, each using a different model (linear integer, constraint programming
and quadratic integer) to certify that a given Golomb ruler is optimal. We
propose several enhancements to improve the computational performance of each
method by exploring bound tightening, valid inequalities, cutting planes and
branching strategies. We conclude that a certain quadratic integer programming
model solved through a Benders decomposition and strengthened by two types of
valid inequalities performs the best in terms of solution time for small-sized
Golomb ruler problem instances. On the other hand, a constraint programming
model improved by range reduction and a particular branching strategy could
have more potential to solve larger size instances due to its promising
parallelization features
A note on the primal-dual method for the semi-metric labeling problem
Recently, Komodakis et al. [6] developed the FastPD
algorithm for the semi-metric labeling problem, which extends
the expansion move algorithm of Boykov et al. [2]. We
present a slightly different derivation of the FastPD method
On Minimal Valid Inequalities for Mixed Integer Conic Programs
We study disjunctive conic sets involving a general regular (closed, convex,
full dimensional, and pointed) cone K such as the nonnegative orthant, the
Lorentz cone or the positive semidefinite cone. In a unified framework, we
introduce K-minimal inequalities and show that under mild assumptions, these
inequalities together with the trivial cone-implied inequalities are sufficient
to describe the convex hull. We study the properties of K-minimal inequalities
by establishing algebraic necessary conditions for an inequality to be
K-minimal. This characterization leads to a broader algebraically defined class
of K- sublinear inequalities. We establish a close connection between
K-sublinear inequalities and the support functions of sets with a particular
structure. This connection results in practical ways of showing that a given
inequality is K-sublinear and K-minimal.
Our framework generalizes some of the results from the mixed integer linear
case. It is well known that the minimal inequalities for mixed integer linear
programs are generated by sublinear (positively homogeneous, subadditive and
convex) functions that are also piecewise linear. This result is easily
recovered by our analysis. Whenever possible we highlight the connections to
the existing literature. However, our study unveils that such a cut generating
function view treating the data associated with each individual variable
independently is not possible in the case of general cones other than
nonnegative orthant, even when the cone involved is the Lorentz cone
Maximum Persistency in Energy Minimization
We consider discrete pairwise energy minimization problem (weighted
constraint satisfaction, max-sum labeling) and methods that identify a globally
optimal partial assignment of variables. When finding a complete optimal
assignment is intractable, determining optimal values for a part of variables
is an interesting possibility. Existing methods are based on different
sufficient conditions. We propose a new sufficient condition for partial
optimality which is: (1) verifiable in polynomial time (2) invariant to
reparametrization of the problem and permutation of labels and (3) includes
many existing sufficient conditions as special cases. We pose the problem of
finding the maximum optimal partial assignment identifiable by the new
sufficient condition. A polynomial method is proposed which is guaranteed to
assign same or larger part of variables than several existing approaches. The
core of the method is a specially constructed linear program that identifies
persistent assignments in an arbitrary multi-label setting.Comment: Extended technical report for the CVPR 2014 paper. Update: correction
to the proof of characterization theore
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