Difference: IntegerProgrammingWithAMPL (3 vs. 4)

Revision 42008-05-11 - MichaelOSullivan

  META TOPICPARENT 
 name="IntegerProgramming" 

 Integer Programming with AMPL
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 To demonstrate the techniques we can use to control integer programming we will look at a simple integer programming problem:
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+Jim has three requests for frozen ice sculptures, his commission is $1000, $7000 and $5000 respectively. He must hire a refrigeration unit to transport each one. The units cost $4000 each. The sculptures will be transported on a truck with capacity 1.7 tonnes and he estimates the total weight of each sculpture (including the refrigeration unit) to be 1 tonne, half a tonne and a quarter of a tonne respectively. Jim must decide which sculptures to make to maximize his profit.
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+ Jim has three requests for frozen ice sculptures, his commission is $10000, $7000 and $5000 respectively. He must hire a refrigeration unit to transport each one. The units cost $4000 each. The sculptures will be transported on a truck with capacity 1.7 tonnes and he estimates the total weight of each sculpture (including the refrigeration unit) to be 1 tonne, half a tonne and a quarter of a tonne respectively. Jim must decide which sculptures to make to maximize his profit.
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+The AMPL model and data files, ice.mod and ice.dat respectively, are attached.
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+The AMPL model and data files, ice.mod and ice.dat respectively, are attached.
 Solving this problem with AMPL and CPLEX is very fast (it is only a small problem):
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 However, sometimes all the technology behind CPLEX does not work so well and we need to control the branch-and-bound tree. We will use this small example problem to demonstrate the effect of changing the default behaviour of CPLEX.

First, let's remove all the CPLEX technology and re-solve our problem using an AMPL script:
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+reset;

model ice.mod;
data ice.dat;

option solver cplex;

option presolve 0;
option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1' &
                      'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &
                      'heurfreq -1');

solve;

display Fridges, Make;
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+reset;  model ice.mod; data ice.dat;  option solver cplex;  option presolve 0; option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1' &                       'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &                       'heurfreq -1');  solve;  display Fridges, Make;
 With all CPLEXs "bells and whistles" removed we get a slightly larger branch-and-bound tree:
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 Let's look at ways to reduce the size of this branch-and-bound tree.
 If we look at the variables we can see where our solution is fractional:
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+As you can see we are using 2.8 fridge units for our 2.8 sculptures. Also, if we check the TotalWeight constraint (display TotalWeight.body;) we can see that the truck is at its weight limit.
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+As you can see we are using 2.8 fridge units for our 2.8 sculptures. Also, if we check the TotalWeight constraint (display TotalWeight.body;) we can see that the truck is at its weight limit.
 It looks likely that we should only use 2 fridges. We can create some new suffixes to experiment with our hypothesis.

 Priorities, Searching and Directions 

AMPL and CPLEX allow you to define a priority for your integer variables. This means that if more than one integer variable is fractional in a solution, CPLEX will branch on the highest priority variable first. Let's add the priority suffix to our run file (before solving):
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+suffix priority IN, integer, >= 0, <= 9999;

(now we can assign variables priorities ranging from 0 - least - to 9999 - most). Let's give the Fridges variable a priority of 100 and the Make variables a priority of 0:
let Fridges.priority := 100;
let {s in SCULPTURES} Make[s].priority := 0;
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+suffix priority IN, integer, >= 0, <= 9999; 
 (now we can assign variables priorities ranging from 0 - least - to 9999 - most). Let's give the Fridges variable a priority of 100 and the Make variables a priority of 0: let Fridges.priority := 100; let {s in SCULPTURES} Make[s].priority := 0;
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 The branch-and-bound tree appears unchanged, so perhaps CPLEX had already branched on Fridges early in the branch-and-bound tree. However, we can try a breadth-first search of the tree, since this will try different values for Fridges before performing branching on other variables. Setting nodeselect to 2 (best estimate) and backtrack to 0 makes CPLEX perform a search very close to breadth-first (see The AMPL CPLEX User Guide for full details).
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+option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1 ' &
                      'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &
                      'heurfreq -1 ' &
                      'nodeselect 2 backtrack 0');
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+option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1 ' &                       'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &                       'heurfreq -1 ' &                       'nodeselect 2 backtrack 0');
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 Now the tree has been fathomed earlier (it only has 4 nodes instead of 6). However, we are not sure if CPLEX branched down to 2 fridges first (our hypothetical optimum).

To control the direction of the branches we can create a new suffix for the direction we should branch on each variable (-1 for down, 0 for no preference, 1 for up).
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+suffix direction IN, integer, >= -1, <= 1;
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+suffix direction IN, integer, >= -1, <= 1;
 We can force a down branch first on Fridges:
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+let Fridges.direction := -1;
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+let Fridges.direction := -1;
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 This doesn't seem to have decreased the size of the branch-and-bound tree.

Let's try one more thing. We have given CPLEX a good branch to try first, but we have not carefully considered what to do next. Let's remove the breadth-first search option and let CPLEX decide how to proceed:
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+reset;

model ice.mod;
data ice.dat;

option solver cplex;

option presolve 0;
option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1' &
                      'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &
                      'heurfreq -1');

suffix priority IN, integer, >= 0, <= 9999;
suffix direction IN, integer, >= -1, <= 1;

let Fridges.priority := 100;
let {s in SCULPTURES} Make[s].priority := 0;

let Fridges.direction := -1;

solve;

display Fridges, Make;
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+reset;  model ice.mod; data ice.dat;  option solver cplex;  option presolve 0; option cplex_options ('timing 1 mipdisplay 5 mipinterval 1' &                       'presolve 0 mipcuts -1 cutpass -1 ' &                       'heurfreq -1');  suffix priority IN, integer, >= 0, <= 9999; suffix direction IN, integer, >= -1, <= 1;  let Fridges.priority := 100; let {s in SCULPTURES} Make[s].priority := 0;  let Fridges.direction := -1;  solve;  display Fridges, Make;
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 Now we have reduced our branch-and-bound tree to a single node by making a good choice about our first variable branch and letting CPLEX proceed from there.

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