A class of generalized variable penalty methods for nonlinear programming

A class of generalized variable penalty formulations for solving nonlinear programming problems is presented. The method poses a sequence of unconstrained optimization problems with mechanisms to control the quality of the approximation for the Hessian matrix, which is expressed in terms of the constraint functions and their first derivatives. The unconstrained problems are solved using a modified Newton's algorithm. The method is particularly applicable to solution techniques where an approximate analysis step has to be used (e.g., constraint approximations, etc.), which often results in the violation of the constraints. The generalized penalty formulation contains two floating parameters, which are used to meet the penalty requirements and to control the errors in the approximation of the Hessian matrix. A third parameter is used to vary the class of standard barrier or quasibarrier functions, forming a branch of the variable penalty formulation. Several possibilities for choosing such floating parameters are discussed. The numerical effectiveness of this algorithm is demonstrated on a relatively large set of test examples.The author is thankful for the constructive suggestions of the referees.