Seminar: Search & Optimization

Course Number 31706-01
Lecturers Malte Helmert
Gabriele Röger
Assistants Manuel Heusner
Florian Pommerening
Silvan Sievers
Salome Simon
Martin Wehrle
Time and Location Thu 15:15 - 17:00; Seminarraum 205, Bernoullistrasse 14/16
Start 18-09-2014
Prerequisites Foundations of AI (CS205) or willingness to study the relevant topics independently.
Objectives * Developing knowledge about the history and state of the art in (certain areas of) search and optimization.
* Reading and understanding scientific literature.
* Analyzing and comparing algorithms.
* Understanding the link between the guiding intuitions of an algorithm and its concrete design.
* Developing and presenting scientific talks.
* Conducting scientific discussions with peers.
* Writing scientific reports.
Contents Search and optimization are central topics in artificial intelligence and other areas of computer science. The seminar will focus on constraint satisfaction and optimization problems. Guiding questions include: what are the foundational algorithms in this area? How do they relate to each other? What are their guiding design principles?
Literature Literature references for each seminar topic will be provided on the seminar page at the start of the semester.
Assessment Lehrveranst.-begleitend

Please note : Participants are required to submit a written report on their seminar topic, present a talk on the topic, and participate actively in the seminar discussions. These three aspects will be individually graded on a scale of 1.0-6.0, and the overall grade for the seminar will be determined as a weighted average of the three components.
Credit Points 3
Grades 1-6 0,5
Modules Modul Praxis aktueller Informatikmethoden (MSF - Informatik)
Modul Seminar (Master Informatik 10)
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Schedule and Topics

18.09.2014 Organization
(slides) (print version)
25.09.2014 Mathematical Background
(slides) (print version)

Organization II
(slides) (print version)
02.10.2014 Introduction to Mercurial
(slides)

Introduction to JaCoP
(Potion Puzzle) (formulation in JaCoP; Main.java)
09.10.2014 Constraint Networks
Presentation: Dario Maggi
(slides)
16.10.2014 Basic Inference Methods
Presentation: Martin Wehrle
(slides) (print version)
23.10.2014 Look-Ahead Search
Presentation: Malte Helmert
30.10.2014 Look-back Strategies
Presentation: Cedric Geissmann
(slides)
06.11.2014 Directional Consistency
Presentation: Gabi Röger
(slides)
13.11.2014 Stochastic Search
Presentation: Michaja Pressmar
(slides)
20.11.2014 Tree Decomposition
Presentation: Mario Weber
(slides)
04.12.2014 Temporal Constraint Networks
Presentation: Esteban Lanter
(slides)