Conjugate Gradient

Source file

wc_conjugate_gradient(L, n; solver=Clarabel.Optimizer, verbose=true)

Problem statement

Compute a PEPit worst-case guarantee for wc_conjugate_gradient.

Consider the convex minimization problem

\[f_\star \triangleq \min_x f(x),\]

where $f$ is $L$-smooth and convex.

Performance metric

This code computes a worst-case guarantee for the conjugate gradient (CG) method (with exact span searches). That is, it computes the smallest possible $\tau(n, L)$ such that the guarantee

\[f(x_n) - f_\star \leqslant \tau(n, L) \|x_0-x_\star\|^2\]

is valid, where $x_n$ is the output of the conjugate gradient method, and where $x_\star$ is a minimizer of $f$. In short, for given values of $n$ and $L$, $\tau(n, L)$ is computed as the worst-case value of $f(x_n)-f_\star$ when $\|x_0-x_\star\|^2 \leqslant 1$.

Algorithm

\[x_{t+1} = x_t - \sum_{i=0}^t \gamma_i \nabla f(x_i)\]

with

\[(\gamma_i)_{i \leqslant t} = \arg\min_{(\gamma_i)_{i \leqslant t}} f \left(x_t - \sum_{i=0}^t \gamma_i \nabla f(x_i) \right)\]

Theoretical guarantee

The **tight** guarantee obtained in [1] is

\[f(x_n) - f_\star \leqslant\frac{L}{2 \theta_n^2}\|x_0-x_\star\|^2.\]

where

\[ \begin{aligned} \theta_0 & = & 1 \\ \theta_t & = & \frac{1 + \sqrt{4 \theta_{t-1}^2 + 1}}{2}, \forall t \in [|1, n-1|] \\ \theta_n & = & \frac{1 + \sqrt{8 \theta_{n-1}^2 + 1}}{2}, \end{aligned} and tightness follows from [2, Theorem 3].\]

References

The detailed approach (based on convex relaxations) is available in [1, Corollary 6].

[1] Y. Drori and A. Taylor (2020). Efficient first-order methods for convex minimization: a constructive approach. Mathematical Programming 184 (1), 183-220.

[2] Y. Drori (2017). The exact information-based complexity of smooth convex minimization. Journal of Complexity, 39, 1-16.

Arguments

  • L: smoothness or Lipschitz parameter, as used by the modeled class.
  • n: number of iterations.
  • solver: JuMP optimizer constructor used to solve the generated SDP.
  • verbose: print example and solver progress information when true.

Returns

  • pepit_tau: worst-case value
  • theoretical_tau: theoretical value

Julia usage

pepit_tau, theoretical_tau = wc_conjugate_gradient(1.0, 2; solver=Clarabel.Optimizer, verbose=true)
## Returns approximately: (pepit_tau, theoretical_tau) = (0.061894, 0.061894)