Paper Info
Title
Declarative Local-Search Neighbourhoods in MiniZinc
Abstract
The aim of solver-independent modelling is to create a model of a satisfaction or optimisation problem independent of a particular technology. This avoids early commitment to a solving technology and allows easy comparison of technologies. MiniZinc is a solver-independent modelling language, supported by CP, MIP, SAT, SMT, and constraint-based local search (CBLS) backends. Some technologies, in particular CP and CBLS, require not only a model but also a search strategy. While backends for these technologies offer default search strategies, it is often beneficial to include in a model a user-specified search strategy for a particular technology, especially if the strategy can encapsulate knowledge about the problem structure. This is complex since a local-search strategy (comprising a neighbourhood, a heuristic, and a meta-heuristic) is often tightly tied to the model. Hence we wish to use the same language for specifying the model and the local search. We show how to extend MiniZinc so that one can attach a fully declarative neighbourhood specification to a model, while maintaining the solver-independence of the language. We explain how to integrate a model-specific declarative neighbourhood with an existing CBLS backend for MiniZinc.
Year
DOI
Venue
2018
10.1109/ICTAI.2018.00025
2018 IEEE 30th International Conference on Tools with Artificial Intelligence (ICTAI)
Keywords
Field
DocType
declarative neighbourhood,(constraint-based) local search,modelling
Heuristic,Programming language,Computer science,Neighbourhood (mathematics),Artificial intelligence,Local search (optimization),Machine learning
Conference
ISSN
ISBN
Citations 
1082-3409
978-1-5386-7450-5
0
PageRank 
References 
Authors
0.34
0
5
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Gustav Björdal121.39
Pierre Flener253350.28
Justin Pearson323724.28
Peter J. Stuckey44368457.58
Guido Tack537727.56