That would solve the problem. Seems a bit messy though, since you now have two conflicting stopping conditions, one you provide in the checker implementation, the other in the function call. I am not clear why if you are throwing an exception you don't provide more information inside it, so the user can adjust their logic based on it.
Also, it seems like some classes, like CMAESOptimizer, also take number iterations in their constructor. On Nov 19, 2012, at 7:36 PM, Gilles Sadowski <gil...@harfang.homelinux.org> wrote: > Hello. > > On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 04:47:08PM -0500, Bruce A Johnson wrote: >> On Nov 17, 2012, at 6:57 PM, Konstantin Berlin wrote: >> >>> There are numerous examples when the optimization might not have >>> converged to the stopping condition, but the minimum discovered point >>> is better than the starting point that was initially provided. The >>> user should have the ability to at least decide if it is good enough, >>> or use it as a starting point into a different optimization run. This >>> is the behavior that most optimizers have, including MATLAB. >>> >>> This functionality important when you have a time constraint, where any >>> improvement in result is better than no information at all. There are also >>> non-convex regions of a function where the convergence rate is very slow, >>> and you might want to stop. >>> >>> A simple modification for now is to just let >>> org.apache.commons.math3.exception.TooManyEvaluationsException contain >>> within it the best found solution so far. >>> >> >> I agree that there are many situations where one is constrained by the >> amount of resources one can throw at a problem and the user would like the >> best solution given those resources (here, the maximum number of iterations) >> so I fully support a solution that lets us get the best solution that has >> been achieved. I wonder if it is possible, instead of using the exception, >> to specify a convergence checker that checks not only the tolerances, but >> could instead return success if the maximum number of iterations has been >> exceeded. I realize this will look inappropriate to some, but using the >> convergence checker in this way would be entirely up to the person calling >> it. If you can get back the number of iterations used, then presumably if >> that is equal to the max you'll know it hasn't really converged. > > Your proposal is brilliant: problem solved (IMHO)! > The convergence checkers are there to allow users to define their notion > of convergence; and the API provides the current iteration count. > > We could add this feature in CM's "Simple...Checker" implementations by > adding one constructor (and an if-block in the "converged" method) without > touching the optimizers. > The user who passes such a checker will indeed be aware of the implication: > the algorithm might quietly terminate before reaching the optimal solution. > > Shall I > 1. resolve the issue as "Not a Problem" (the user should implement his own > custom checker) or > 2. add the constructors in the checkers defined within CM and resolve as > "Fixed"? > > > Regards, > Gilles > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@commons.apache.org > For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@commons.apache.org > --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: dev-unsubscr...@commons.apache.org For additional commands, e-mail: dev-h...@commons.apache.org
