Multiple objective linear programming models with interval coefficients – an illustrated overview

In most real-world situations, the coefficients of decision support models are not exactly known. In this context, it is convenient to consider an extension of traditional mathematical programming models incorporating their intrinsic uncertainty, without assuming the exactness of the model coefficients. Interval programming is one of the tools to tackle uncertainty in mathematical programming models. Moreover, most real-world problems inherently impose the need to consider multiple, conflicting and incommensurate objective functions. This paper provides an illustrated overview of the state of the art of Interval Programming in the context of multiple objective linear programming models.     

A linear programming approach for linear programs with probabilistic constraints

We study a class of mixed-integer programs for solving linear programs with joint probabilistic constraints from random right-hand side vectors with finite distributions. We present greedy and dual heuristic algorithms that construct and solve a sequence of linear programs. We provide optimality gaps for our heuristic solutions via the linear programming relaxation of the extended mixed-integer formulation of Luedtke et al. (2010) [13] as well as via lower bounds produced by their cutting plane method. While we demonstrate through an extensive computational study the effectiveness and scalability of our heuristics, we also prove that the theoretical worst-case solution quality for these algorithms is arbitrarily far from optimal. Our computational study compares our heuristics against both the extended mixed-integer programming formulation and the cutting plane method of Luedtke et al. (2010) [13]. Our heuristics efficiently and consistently produce solutions with small optimality gaps, while for larger instances the extended formulation becomes intractable and the optimality gaps from the cutting plane method increase to over 5%.     

Posynomial geometric programming with interval exponents and coefficients

Geometric programming provides a powerful tool for solving nonlinear problems where nonlinear relations can be well presented by an exponential or power function. In the real world, many applications of geometric programming are engineering design problems in which some of the problem parameters are estimates of actual values. This paper develops a solution method when the exponents in the objective function, the cost and the constraint coefficients, and the right-hand sides are imprecise and represented as interval data. Since the parameters of the problem are imprecise, the objective value should be imprecise as well. A pair of two-level mathematical programs is formulated to obtain the upper bound and lower bound of the objective values. Based on the duality theorem and by applying a variable separation technique, the pair of two-level mathematical programs is transformed into a pair of ordinary one-level geometric programs. Solving the pair of geometric programs produces the interval of the objective value. The ability of calculating the bounds of the objective value developed in this paper might help lead to more realistic modeling efforts in engineering optimization areas.     

A mixed integer linear programming formulation of the maximum betweenness problem

This paper considers the maximum betweenness problem. A new mixed integer linear programming (MILP) formulation is presented and validity of this formulation is given. Experimental results are performed on randomly generated instances from the literature. The results of CPLEX solver, based on the proposed MILP formulation, are compared with results obtained by total enumeration technique. The results show that CPLEX optimally solves instances of up to 30 elements and 60 triples in a short period of time.     

Generalized linear fractional programming under interval uncertainty

Data in many real-life engineering and economical problems suffer from inexactness. Herein we assume that we are given some intervals in which the data can simultaneously and independently perturb. We consider a generalized linear fractional programming problem with interval data and present an efficient method for computing the range of optimal values. The method reduces the problem to solving from two to four real-valued generalized linear fractional programs, which can be computed in polynomial time using an appropriate interior point method solver.     

Discrete linear bilevel programming problem

In this paper, we analyze some properties of the discrete linear bilevel program for different discretizations of the set of variables. We study the geometry of the feasible set and discuss the existence of an optimal solution. We also establish equivalences between different classes of discrete linear bilevel programs and particular linear multilevel programming problems. These equivalences are based on concave penalty functions and can be used to design penalty function methods for the solution of discrete linear bilevel programs.Support of this work has been provided by the INIC (Portugal) under Contract 89/EXA/5, by INVOTAN, FLAD, and CCLA (Portugal), and by FCAR (Québec), NSERC, and DND-ARP (Canada).     

A class of possibilistic portfolio selection model with interval coefficients and its application

Because of the existence of non-stochastic factors in stock markets, several possibilistic portfolio selection models have been proposed, where the expected return rates of securities are considered as fuzzy variables with possibilistic distributions. This paper deals with a possibilistic portfolio selection model with interval center values. By using modality approach and goal attainment approach, it is converted into a nonlinear goal programming problem. Moreover, a genetic algorithm is designed to obtain a satisfactory solution to the possibilistic portfolio selection model under complicated constraints. Finally, a numerical example based on real world data is also provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the genetic algorithm.     

An interval programming approach for developing economic order quantity model with imprecise exponents and coefficients

This paper develops an economic order quantity (EOQ) model with uncertain data. For modelling the uncertainty in real-world data, the exponents and coefficients in demand and cost functions are considered as interval data and then, the related model is designed. The proposed model maximises the profit and determines the price, marketing cost and lot sizing with the interval data. Since the model parameters are imprecise, the objective value is imprecise, too. So, the upper and lower bounds are specially formulated for the problem and then, the model is transferred to a geometric program. The resulted geometric program is solved by using the duality approach and the lower and upper bounds are found out for the objective function and variables. Two numerical examples and sensitivity analysis are further used to illustrate the performance of the proposed model.     

A linear programming reformulation of the standard quadratic optimization problem

The problem of minimizing a quadratic form over the standard simplex is known as the standard quadratic optimization problem (SQO). It is NP-hard, and contains the maximum stable set problem in graphs as a special case. In this note, we show that the SQO problem may be reformulated as an (exponentially sized) linear program (LP). This reformulation also suggests a hierarchy of polynomial-time solvable LP’s whose optimal values converge finitely to the optimal value of the SQO problem. The hierarchies of LP relaxations from the literature do not share this finite convergence property for SQO, and we review the relevant counterexamples.     

A concept of a robust solution of a multicriterial linear programming problem

A new concept of a robust solution of a multicriterial linear programming problem is proposed. The robust solution is understood here as the best starting point, prepared while the preferences of the decision maker with respect to the criteria are still unknown, for the adaptation of the solution to the preferences of the decision maker, once they are finally known. The objective is the total cost of the initial preparation and of the later potential adaptation of the solution. In the starting robust solution the decision variables may have interval values. The problem can be solved by means of the simplex algorithm. A numerical example illustrates the approach.     

Solving the plant location problem on a line by linear programming

This paper investigates the simple uncapacitated plant location problem on a line. We show that under general conditions the special structure of the problem allows the optimal solution to be obtained directly from a linear programming relaxation. This result may be extended to the related p-median problem on a line. Thus, the practitioner is now able to use readily available LP codes in place of specialized algorithms to solve these one-dimensional models. The findings also shed some light on the “integer friendliness” of the general problem.     

A new nonlinear interval programming method for uncertain problems with dependent interval variables

This paper proposes a new nonlinear interval programming method that can be used to handle uncertain optimization problems when there are dependencies among the interval variables. The uncertain domain is modeled using a multidimensional parallelepiped interval model. The model depicts single-variable uncertainty using a marginal interval and depicts the degree of dependencies among the interval variables using correlation angles and correlation coefficients. Based on the order relation of interval and the possibility degree of interval, the uncertain optimization problem is converted to a deterministic two-layer nesting optimization problem. The affine coordinate is then introduced to convert the uncertain domain of a multidimensional parallelepiped interval model to a standard interval uncertain domain. A highly efficient iterative algorithm is formulated to generate an efficient solution for the multi-layer nesting optimization problem after the conversion. Three computational examples are given to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

A mixed integer linear programming formulation of the optimal mean/Value-at-Risk portfolio problem

In this paper, we consider an extension of the Markovitz model, in which the variance has been replaced with the Value-at-Risk. So a new portfolio optimization problem is formulated. We showed that the model leads to an NP-hard problem, but if the number of past observation T or the number of assets K are low, e.g. fixed to a constant, polynomial time algorithms exist. Furthermore, we showed that the problem can be formulated as an integer programming instance. When K and T are large and α^VaR is small—as common in financial practice—the computational results show that the problem can be solved in a reasonable amount of time.     

A procedure for parameterizing a constraint in linear programming

A post-optimal procedure for parameterizing a constraint in linear programming is proposed. In the derivation of the procedure, the technique of pivotal operations (Jordan eliminations) is applied. The procedure is compared to another by Orchard-Hays [2], and a numerical example of the procedure is provided.     

A finite algorithm for the least two-norm solution of a linear program 1

By perturbing properly a linear program to a separable quadratic program it is possible to solve the latter in its dual variable space by iterative techniques such as sparsity-preserving SOR (successive overtaxation techniques). In this way large sparse linear programs can be handled.

In this paper we give a new computational criterion to check whether the solution of the perturbed quadratic program provides the least 2-norm solution of the original linear program. This criterion improves on the criterion proposed in an earlier paper.

We also describe an algorithm for solving linear programs which is based on the SOR methods. The main property of this algorithm is that, under mild assumptions, it finds the least 2-norm solution of a linear program in a finite number of iteration.s     

A procedure for one-parametric linear programming

A procedure is proposed for the parametric linear programming problem where all the coefficients are linear or polynomial functions of a scalar parameter. The solution vector and the optimum value are determined explicitly as rational functions of the parameter. In addition to standard linear programming technique, only the determination of eigenvalues is required. The procedure is compared to those by Dinkelbach and Zsigmond, and a numerical example is given.     

The Complex Interior-Boundary method for linear and nonlinear programming with linear constraints

In this paper we develop the Complex method; an algorithm for solving linear programming (LP) problems with interior search directions. The Complex Interior-Boundary method (as the name suggests) moves in the interior of the feasible region from one boundary point to another of the feasible region bypassing several extreme points at a time. These directions of movement are guaranteed to improve the objective function. As a result, the Complex method aims to reach the optimal point faster than the Simplex method on large LP programs. The method also extends to nonlinear programming (NLP) with linear constraints as compared to the generalized-reduced gradient.The Complex method is based on a pivoting operation which is computationally efficient operation compared to some interior-point methods. In addition, our algorithm offers more flexibility in choosing the search direction than other pivoting methods (such as reduced gradient methods). The interior direction of movement aims at reducing the number of iterations and running time to obtain the optimal solution of the LP problem compared to the Simplex method. Furthermore, this method is advantageous to Simplex and other convex programs in regard to starting at a Basic Feasible Solution (BFS); i.e. the method has the ability to start at any given feasible solution.Preliminary testing shows that the reduction in the computational effort is promising compared to the Simplex method.     

A randomized algorithm for fixed-dimensional linear programming

We give a (Las Vegas) randomized algorithm for linear programming in a fixed dimensiond for which the expected computation time is , where lim _{d d} = 0. This improves the corresponding worst-case complexity, . The method is based on a recent idea of Clarkson. Two variations on the algorithm are examined briefly.     

Integer linear programming models for grid-based light post location problem

Selecting optimal location is a key decision problem in business and engineering. This research focuses to develop mathematical models for a special type of location problems called grid-based location problems. It uses a real-world problem of placing lights in a park to minimize the amount of darkness and excess supply. The non-linear nature of the supply function (arising from the light physics) and heterogeneous demand distribution make this decision problem truly intractable to solve. We develop ILP models that are designed to provide the optimal solution for the light post problem: the total number of light posts, the location of each light post, and their capacities (i.e., brightness). Finally, the ILP models are implemented within a standard modeling language and solved with the CPLEX solver. Results show that the ILP models are quite efficient in solving moderately sized problems with a very small optimality gap.