Presenter: Leo, Shih-Chang, Lin

Advisor: Frank, Yeong-Sung, Lin

06/20/15

Agenda
What is Tabu search?
Heuristic search
Tabu search

Characteristic
Elements definition
Tabu search process
Algorithm

Application TSP
Related study
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What is Tabu Search?

Proposed by Fred Glover in 1989
A kind of heuristic search
Used for solving combinatorial

optimization problems
Short term
Get the local optimum

Long term
Intensification and diversification
Leave the local optimum to get global

optimum

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Heuristic Search(1/2)
Characteristic:
or experienced search
not always find the best solution
guarantee to find a good solution in

reasonable time.
By sacrificing completeness it increases
efficiency.
Useful in solving tough problems

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Heuristic Search(2/2)
Steps
1. Generate a possible solution which can

either be a point in the problem space

or a path from the initial state.
2. Test to see if this possible solution is a
real solution by comparing the state
reached with the set of goal states.
3. If it is a real solution, return. Otherwise
repeat from 1.

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Tabu Search(1/7)
Characteristic
Capability of getting global solution

instead of local solution

Tabu list can avoid repeating trivial
search
Update tabu list to speed up searching

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Tabu Search(2/7)
Elements Definition
Neighborhood solution a solution

which must exist in a set of feasible

solution, and which is not in the tabu list.
Move change the current solution to

its neighborhood solution.

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Tabu Search(3/7)
Tabu List a short-term memory which

records the solutions that have been visited

in the recent past. In this way, we can avoid
repeating search. In general, tabu list has a
fixed size to memorize, and it follows FIFO to
maintain the list.
Aspiration Criteria when a solution in the

tabu list is better than the currently-known

best solution, the solution is permitted to
replace the currently-known solution with the
best solution.
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Tabu Search(4/7)
Stopping Criteria the stopping

conditions
Maximum iterative numbers
Maximum times which counts when object
functions value doesnt improve
The longest default execution time of CPU
When object functions output is
acceptable

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Tabu Search(5/7)
Algorithm

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Tabu Search(6 / 7)
Process

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Tabu Search( 7 / 7)

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Application(1/7)
Traveling Salesman Problem
(A Comparative Study of Tabu Search and Simulated
Annealing for Traveling Salesman Problem by Sachin
Jayaswal, University of Waterloo)

a problem where starting from a node it

is required to visit every other node only

once in a way that the total distance
covered is minimized.

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Application(2/7)
Tabu Search for TSP
Solution Representation

A feasible solution is represented as a

sequence of nodes, each node appearing
only once and in the order it is visited. The
first and the last visited nodes are fixed to
1.

3 5 2 4 7 6 8 1
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Application(3/7)
Initial Solution
A good feasible, yet not-optimal, solution
to the TSP can be found quickly using a
greedy approach.
Starting with the first node in the tour, find
the nearest node.
Each time find the nearest unvisited node
from the current node until all the nodes
are visited.

3 5 2 4 7 6 8 1
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Application(4/7)
Neighborhood solution
A neighborhood solution to a given
solution is defined as any other solution
that is obtained by a pair wise exchange of
any two nodes in the solution.
If we fix node 1 as the start and the end
node, for a problem of N nodes, there are
Cn-12 such neighborhoods to a given
solution.

3 5 2 4 7 6 8 1
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Application(5/7)
Tabu List
Initially, it is empty
the attribute stored in the Tabu list is a pair
of nodes that have been exchanged recently.
Aspiration criteria
The criterion used for this to happen in the
present problem of TSP is to allow a move,
even if it is in tabu list, if it results in a
solution with an objective value better than
that of the current best-known solution.
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Application(6/7)
Termination criteria
The algorithm terminates if a pre-specified
number of iterations is reached .

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Application(7/7)
Computational Experience
#Nodes

Min
Dist

Max
Dist

Optimu
m
(GAMS)

Tabu Search
Object

% Gap

10

100

1000

3043

3043

15

50

200

1167

1167

20

200

1200

6223

6436

3.42

40

200

2000

22244

23513

5.70

52

N/A

N/A

118282

125045

5.72

127

N/A

N/A

7542

8667.83

14.93

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Related study
( , and ,1997)

Different parameters set in Tabu search

affect the quality of optimum

The size of Tabu list
n is the amount of cities, x is the coefficient of

Tabu list
0.5n <(0.5+(2.5x)/4)n < 3n
2.375n as x = 3

The maximum of iteration

If n <50, iteration >= 2000
If n >50 , iteration >= 4000
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