Optimization environments and the NEOS server
- Argonne National Lab., IL (United States). Mathematics and Computer Science Div.
The authors are interested in the development of problem-solving environments that simplify the formulation of optimization problems, and the access to computational resources. Once the problem has been formulated, the first step in solving an optimization problem in a typical computational environment is to identify and obtain the appropriate piece of optimization software. Once the software has been installed and tested in the local environment, the user must read the documentation and write code to define the optimization problem in the manner required by the software. Typically, Fortran or C code must be written to define the problem, compute function values and derivatives, and specify sparsity patterns. Finally, the user must debug, compile, link, and execute the code. The Network-Enabled Optimization System (NEOS) is an Internet-based service for optimization providing information, software, and problem-solving services for optimization. The main components of NEOS are the NEOS Guide and the NEOS Server. The current version of the NEOS Server is described in Section 2. The authors emphasize nonlinear optimization problems, but NEOS does handle linear and nonlinearly constrained optimization problems, and solvers for optimization problems subject to integer variables are being added. In Section 4 the authors begin to explore possible extensions to the NEOS Server by discussing the addition of solvers for global optimization problems. Section 5 discusses how a remote procedure call (RPC) interface to NEOS addresses some of the limitations of NEOS in the areas of security and usability. The detailed implementation of such an interface raises a number of questions, such as exactly how the RPC is implemented, what security or authentication approaches are used, and what techniques are used to improve the efficiency of the communication. They outline some of the issues in network computing that arise from the emerging style of computing used by NEOS.
- Research Organization:
- Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Energy Research, Washington, DC (United States)
- DOE Contract Number:
- W-31109-ENG-38
- OSTI ID:
- 563264
- Report Number(s):
- ANL/MCS-P-654-0397; CONF-9607197-1; ON: DE97053059; TRN: AHC29803%%101
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 3. international workshop on short term experiments under strongly reduced gravity conditions, Bremen (Germany), 8-11 Jul 1996; Other Information: PBD: Mar 1997
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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