Code a linear programming exercise by hand

Question

I have been doing linear programming problems in my class by graphing them but I would like to know how to write a program for a particular problem to solve it for me. If there are too many variables or constraints I could never do this by graphing.

Example problem, maximize 5x + 3y with constraints:

• 5x - 2y >= 0
• x + y <= 7
• x <= 5
• x >= 0
• y >= 0

I graphed this and got a visible region with 3 corners. x=5 y=2 is the optimal point.

How do I turn this into code? I know of the simplex method. And very importantly, will all LP problems be coded in the same structure? Would brute force work?

Answer 1

There are quite a number of Simplex Implementations that you will find if you search.

In addition to the one mentioned in the comment (Numerical Recipes in C), you can also find:

1. Google's own Simplex-Solver
2. Then there's COIN-OR
3. GNU has its own GLPK
4. If you want a C++ implementation, this one in Google Code is actually accessible.
5. There are many implementations in R including the boot package. (In R, you can see the implementation of a function by typing it without the parenthesis.)

To address your other two questions:

1. Will all LPs be coded the same way? Yes, a generic LP solver can be written to load and solve any LP. (There are industry standard formats for reading LP's like mps and .lp

2. Would brute force work? Keep in mind that many companies and big organizations spend a long time on fine tuning the solvers. There are LP's that have interesting properties that many solvers will try to exploit. Also, certain computations can be solved in parallel. The algorithm is exponential, so at some large number of variables/constraints, brute force won't work.

Hope that helps.

Answer 2

I wrote this is matlab yesterday, which could be easily transcribed to C++ if you use Eigen library or write your own matrix class using a std::vector of a std::vector

function [x, fval] = mySimplex(fun, A, B, lb, up)

%Examples paramters to show that the function actually works 

% sample set 1 (works for this data set)

% fun = [8 10 7];
% A = [1 3 2; 1 5 1];
% B = [10; 8];
% lb = [0; 0; 0];
% ub = [inf; inf; inf];

% sample set 2 (works for this data set)

fun = [7 8 10];
A = [2 3 2; 1 1 2];
B = [1000; 800];
lb = [0; 0; 0];
ub = [inf; inf; inf];


% generate a new slack variable for every row of A 

numSlackVars = size(A,1); % need a new slack variables for every row of A 

% Set up tableau to store algorithm data 
tableau = [A; -fun];

tableau = [tableau, eye(numSlackVars + 1)];

lastCol = [B;0];

tableau = [tableau, lastCol];

% for convienience sake, assign the following: 

numRows = size(tableau,1);
numCols = size(tableau,2);

% do simplex algorithm 

% step 0: find num of negative entries in bottom row of tableau 

numNeg = 0; % the number of negative entries in bottom row

for i=1:numCols 
    if(tableau(numRows,i) < 0)
        numNeg = numNeg + 1;
    end
end

% Remark: the number of negatives is exactly the number of iterations needed in the
% simplex algorithm 

for iterations = 1:numNeg 
    % step 1: find minimum value in last row 
    minVal = 10000; % some big number 
    minCol = 1; % start by assuming min value is the first element 
    for i=1:numCols
        if(tableau(numRows, i) < minVal)
            minVal = tableau(size(tableau,1), i);
            minCol = i; % update the index corresponding to the min element 
        end
    end 

    % step 2: Find corresponding ratio vector in pivot column 
    vectorRatio = zeros(numRows -1, 1);
    for i=1:(numRows-1) % the size of ratio vector is numCols - 1
        vectorRatio(i, 1) = tableau(i, numCols) ./ tableau(i, minCol);
    end 

    % step 3: Determine pivot element by finding minimum element in vector
    % ratio

    minVal = 10000; % some big number 
    minRatio = 1; % holds the element with the minimum ratio 

    for i=1:numRows-1
        if(vectorRatio(i,1) < minVal)
            minVal = vectorRatio(i,1);
            minRatio = i;
        end 
    end 

    % step 4: assign pivot element 

    pivotElement = tableau(minRatio, minCol);

    % step 5: perform pivot operation on tableau around the pivot element 

    tableau(minRatio, :) = tableau(minRatio, :) * (1/pivotElement);

    % step 6: perform pivot operation on rows (not including last row)

    for i=1:size(vectorRatio,1)+1 % do last row last 
        if(i ~= minRatio) % we skip over the minRatio'th element of the tableau here 
            tableau(i, :) = -tableau(i,minCol)*tableau(minRatio, :) +  tableau(i,:);
        end
    end
end 

% Now we can interpret the algo tableau 

numVars = size(A,2); % the number of cols of A is the number of variables 

x = zeros(size(size(tableau,1), 1)); % for efficiency 

% Check for basicity 
for col=1:numVars
    count_zero = 0;
    count_one = 0;
    for row = 1:size(tableau,1)
        if(tableau(row,col) < 1e-2)
            count_zero = count_zero + 1;
        elseif(tableau(row,col) - 1 < 1e-2)
            count_one = count_one + 1;
            stored_row = row; % we store this (like in memory) column for later use 
        end
    end
    if(count_zero == (size(tableau,1) -1) && count_one == 1) % this is the case where it is basic 
        x(col,1) = tableau(stored_row, numCols);
    else 
        x(col,1) = 0; % this is the base where it is not basic 
    end
end

% find function optimal value at optimal solution 
fval = x(1,1) * fun(1,1); % just needed for logic to work here 
for i=2:numVars 
    fval = fval + x(i,1) * fun(1,i);
end


end