Acerca de este curso: We’ll implement (in Python) together efficient programs for a problem needed by delivery companies all over the world millions times per day — the travelling salesman problem. The goal in this problem is to visit all the given places as quickly as possible. How to find an optimal solution to this problem quickly? We still don’t have provably efficient algorithms for this difficult computational problem and this is the essence of the P versus NP problem, the most important open question in Computer Science. Still, we’ll implement several solutions for real world instances of the travelling salesman problem. While designing these solutions, we will rely heavily on the material learned in the courses of the specialization: proof techniques, combinatorics, probability, graph theory. We’ll see several examples of using discrete mathematics ideas to get more and more efficient solutions.
Para quién es esta clase: Our intended audience are all people that work or plan to work in IT, starting from motivated high school students.
Creada por: Universidad de California en San Diego, National Research University Higher School of Economics
Enseñado por: Alexander S. Kulikov, Visiting Professor
Department of Computer Science and Engineering
| Información básica | |
| Nivel | Beginner |
| Compromiso | 3 weeks of study, 2–5 hours/week |
| Idioma | English |
| Cómo aprobar | Aprueba todas las tareas calificadas para completar el curso. |
| Calificaciones del usuario |
Programa
SEMANA 1
Traveling Salesman Problem
We start this module with the definition of mathematical model of the delivery problem — the classical traveling salesman problem (usually abbreviated as TSP). We'll then review just a few of its many applications: from straightforward ones (delivering goods, planning a trip) to less obvious ones (data storage and compression, genome assembly). After that, we will together take the first steps in implementing programs for TSP.
4 videos, 1 reading
- Vídeo: Delivery Problem
- Vídeo: Shortest Common Superstring Problem
- Reading: Additional Materials
- Vídeo: Brute Force Search
- Vídeo: Nearest Neighbor
- Notebook: Draw Hamiltonian cycles
- Notebook: Average Weight: Examples
Calificado: Cycle Weight
Calificado: Brute Force Algorithm
Calificado: Average Weight
Calificado: Nearest Neighbors
SEMANA 2
Exact Algorithms
We'll see two general techniques applied to the traveling salesman problem. The first one, branch and bound, is a classical approach in combinatorial optimization that is used for various problems. It can be seen as an improvement of the brute force search: we try to construct a permutation piece by piece, but at each step we check whether it still makes sense to continue constructing the permutation (if it doesn't, we just cut off the current branch). The second one, dynamic programming, is arguably the most popular algorithmic technique. It solves a problem by going through a collection of smaller subproblems.
4 videos, 1 practice quiz
- Vídeo: Branch and Bound
- Vídeo: Dynamic Programming: Main Ideas
- Vídeo: Dynamic Programming: Representing Subsets
- Vídeo: Dynamic Programming: Code
- Practice Quiz: Dynamic Programming
- Notebook: Integer Linear Programming (Optional)
Calificado: Branch and Bound
SEMANA 3
Approximation Algorithms
As we've seen in the previous modules, solving the traveling salesman problem exactly is hard. In fact, we don't even expect an efficient solution in the nearest future. For this reason, it makes sense to ask: is it possible to find efficiently a solution that is probably suboptimal, but at the same time is close to optimal? It turns out that the answer is yes! We'll learn two algorithms. The first one guarantees to find quickly a solution which is at most twice longer than the optimal one. The second algorithms does not have such guarantees, but it is known to work pretty well in practice.
2 videos
- Vídeo: Approximation Algorithms
- Vídeo: Local Search
- Notebook: 2-Approximation. Examples.
Calificado: 2-Approximation
Preguntas Frecuentes
Cómo funciona
Coursework
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Creadores
Universidad de California en San Diego
UC San Diego is an academic powerhouse and economic engine, recognized as one of the top 10 public universities by U.S. News and World Report. Innovation is central to who we are and what we do. Here, students learn that knowledge isn't just acquired in the classroom—life is their laboratory.
National Research University Higher School of Economics
National Research University - Higher School of Economics (HSE) is one of the top research universities in Russia. Established in 1992 to promote new research and teaching in economics and related disciplines, it now offers programs at all levels of university education across an extraordinary range of fields of study including business, sociology, cultural studies, philosophy, political science, international relations, law, Asian studies, media and communications, IT, mathematics, engineering, and more.
Learn more on www.hse.ru
Tarifa
| Comprar curso | |
|---|---|
| Accede a los materiales del curso | Disponible |
| Accede a los materiales con calificación | Disponible |
| Recibe una calificación final | Disponible |
| Obtén un Certificado de curso para compartir | Disponible |
Calificaciones y revisiones
I really enjoyed this course.
This is a nice way to end the course and, seaways nicely into studying algorithms in general.
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Good exercises!