Talk:Nonlinear programming

Kuhn-Tucker

Should a discussion of the optimality conditions (i.e. the Kuhn-Tucker conditions) belong here?

Hello User:Kendrick Hang (I guessed your name from the history of the page). To answer your question, I don't know, I am not familiar with this particular technique (although I am doing some optimization). My opinion would be that you go ahead and try it. If what you want to add is quite long, you could also consider making a separate article. Let's see how it goes. Be bold in updating pages! And it would be nice if you have some references. --Oleg Alexandrov 06:23, 26 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Optimality conditions should most definitely mentioned. Please do add them. We can always reorganize later if necessary. Jitse Niesen 11:39, 26 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Definitely optimality conditions are something which has to be mentioned. I personally prefer the order like in Bazaraa/Sherali/Shetty (why is the older book giuven as a reference in the article?) emanating from the geometric idea (non-existence of a feasible descent direction) via the Fritz John conditins to the KKT, requiring regularity/convexity.

BTW: can anyone tell me how a convex problem could be solved with the same techniques as linear programming (where I suppose the simplex method is referred to)? I would agree that there are similarities if you use active index set strateg but IMHO it's by no means the same method.

Formatting issues

To User: Frau Holle

I noticed that you split the long introduction of the Nonlinear programming page into several sub-sections, like Mathematical formulation of the problem and Methods for solving the problem, etc. But, some text which should have clearly been in Methods for solving the problem you left in the Mathematical formulation of the problem. I fixed that. Please let me know if you think I am wrong about the change.

Oh, and I don't think that the part about the least squares minimization you included in the Examples subsection of the Nonlinear programming page is a true example. What do you think?

Thanks,

--User: Olegalexandrov

Please feel free to make further improvements. I think we both agree that this article is still far from being a good one. And yes, least squares minimization is rather a subclass than an example. - Greetings from hinter den Bergen Frau Holle 16:32, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I removed the least squares minimization part. Wikipedia is an interesting thing. On one hand, it is a collaborative process, so whatever work we do, it will be improved upon. On the other hand, it can be risky to add stuff, hoping that later it will be harmonized/improved by other people. So there is a tricky balansing act. --User: Olegalexandrov

I restored it in the minimal version of a see also link under the heading related topics. The present article seems to be written with economic applications in mind. However, given the state of the optimization (mathematics) article, many readers following the link to nonlinear programming will expect information about nonlinear curve fitting. So the least we can do for them is to redirect them to more pertinent articles. -- Frau Holle 20:30, 22 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! I was not sure whether to keep the link or not. You are right, it is good to have it in there. By the way, how do you insert the current date? I mean, the time you wrote above? Is there an instruction in Wikipedia? --User: Olegalexandrov