Abstract
Stochastic Local Search (SLS) is quite effective for a variety of Combinatorial (Optimization) Problems. However, the performance of SLS depends on several factors and getting it right is not trivial. In practice, SLS may have to be carefully designed and tuned to give good results. Often this is done in an ad-hoc fashion. One approach to this issue is to use a tuning algorithm for finding good parameter settings to a black-box SLS algorithm. Another approach is white-box which takes advantage of the human in the process. In this paper, we show how visualization using a generic visual tool can be effective for a white-box approach to get the right SLS behavior on the fitness landscape of the problem instances at hand. We illustrate this by means of an extended walk-through on the Quadratic Assignment Problem. At the same time, we present the human-centric tool which has been developed.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Charon, I., Hudry, O.: Mixing Different Components of Metaheuristics. In: Meta-Heuristics: Theory and Applications, pp. 589–603. Kluwer, Dordrecht (1996)
Birattari, M.: The Problem of Tuning Metaheuristics as seen from a machine learning perspective. PhD thesis, Université Libre de Bruxelles (2004)
Hoos, H., Stützle, T.: Stochastic Local Search: Foundations and Applications. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco (2005)
Adenso-Diaz, B., Laguna, M.: Fine-tuning of Algorithms Using Fractional Experimental Designs and Local Search. Operations Research 54(1), 99–114 (2006)
Halim, S., Lau, H.: Tuning Tabu Search Strategies via Visual Diagnosis. In: Meta-Heuristics: Progress as Complex Systems Optimization, Kluwer, Dordrecht (2007)
Monett-Diaz, D.: +CARPS: Configuration of Metaheuristics Based on Cooperative Agents. In: International Workshop on Hybrid Metaheuristics, pp. 115–125 (2004)
Hutter, H., Hamadi, Y., Hoos, H., Leyton-Brown, K.: Performance Prediction and Automated Tuning of Randomized and Parametic Algorithms. In: International Conference on Principles and Practice of Constraint Programming, pp. 213–228 (2006)
Merz, P.: Memetic Algorithms for Combinatorial Optimization: Fitness Landscapes & Effective Search Strategies. PhD thesis, University of Siegen, Germany (2000)
Bartz-Beielstein, T.: Experimental Research in Evolutionary Computation: The New Experimentalism. Springer, Heidelberg (2006)
Klau, G., Lesh, N., Marks, J., Mitzenmacher, M.: Human-Guided Tabu Search. In: National Conference on Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), pp. 41–47 (2002)
Syrjakow, M., Szczerbicka, H.: Java-based Animation of Probabilistic Search Algorithms. In: International Conference on Web-based Modeling and Simulation, pp. 182–187 (1999)
Kadluczka, M., Nelson, P., Tirpak, T.: N-to-2-Space Mapping for Visualization of Search Algorithm Performance. In: International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence, pp. 508–513 (2004)
Lau, H., Wan, W., Halim, S.: Tuning Tabu Search Strategies via Visual Diagnosis. In: Metaheuristics International Conference, pp. 630–636 (2005)
Halim, S., Yap, R., Lau, H.: Visualization for Analyzing Trajectory-Based Metaheuristic Search Algorithms. In: European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, pp. 703–704 (2006)
Halim, S., Yap, R., Lau, H.: Viz: A Visual Analysis Suite for Explaining Local Search Behavior. In: User Interface Software and Technology, pp. 57–66 (2006)
Schneider, J., Kirkpatrick, S.: Stochastic Optimization. Springer, Heidelberg (2006)
Taillard, E.: Robust Tabu Search for the Quadratic Assignment Problem. Parallel Computing 17, 443–455 (1991)
Schiavinotto, T., Stützle, T.: A Review of Metrics on Permutations for Search Landscape Analysis. Computers and Operation Research 34(10), 3143–3153 (2007)
Graphviz: Graph Visualization Software, http://www.graphviz.org
Ware, C.: Information Visualization: Perception for Design. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco (2004)
QAPLIB: Quadratic assignment problem library, http://www.seas.upenn.edu/qaplib
Taillard, E.: Comparison of Iterative Searches for the Quadratic Assignment Problem. Location Science 3, 87–105 (1995)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2007 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Halim, S., Yap, R.H.C. (2007). Designing and Tuning SLS Through Animation and Graphics: An Extended Walk-Through. In: Stützle, T., Birattari, M., H. Hoos, H. (eds) Engineering Stochastic Local Search Algorithms. Designing, Implementing and Analyzing Effective Heuristics. SLS 2007. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 4638. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-74446-7_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-74446-7_2
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-74445-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-74446-7
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)