e04 Chapter Contents
e04 Chapter Introduction
NAG Library Manual

# NAG Library Function Documentnag_opt_handle_set_simplebounds (e04rhc)

## 1  Purpose

nag_opt_handle_set_simplebounds (e04rhc) is a part of the NAG optimization modelling suite and defines bounds on the variables of the problem.

## 2  Specification

 #include #include
 void nag_opt_handle_set_simplebounds (void *handle, Integer nvar, const double bl[], const double bu[], NagError *fail)

## 3  Description

After the initialization routine nag_opt_handle_init (e04rac) has been called, nag_opt_handle_set_simplebounds (e04rhc) may be used to define the variable bounds ${l}_{x}\le x\le {u}_{x}$ of the problem unless the bounds have already been defined. This will typically be used for problems, such as quadratic programming (QP)
 $minimize x∈ℝn 12 xTHx + cTx (a) subject to lB≤Bx≤uB (b) lx≤x≤ux (c)$ (1)
nonlinear programming (NLP)
 $minimize x∈ℝn fx (a) subject to lg≤gx≤ug (b) lB≤Bx≤uB (c) lx≤x≤ux (d)$ (2)
linear semidefinite programming (SDP)
 $minimize x∈ℝn cTx (a) subject to ∑ i=1 n xi Aik - A0k ⪰ 0 , k=1,…,mA (b) lB≤Bx≤uB (c) lx≤x≤ux (d)$ (3)
or semidefinite programming with bilinear matrix inequalities (BMI-SDP)
 $minimize x∈ℝn 12 xTHx + cTx (a) subject to ∑ i,j=1 n xi xj Qijk + ∑ i=1 n xi Aik - A0k ⪰ 0 , k=1,…,mA (b) lB≤Bx≤uB (c) lx≤x≤ux (d)$ (4)
where ${l}_{x}$ and ${u}_{x}$ are $n$-dimensional vectors. Note that upper and lower bounds are specified for all the variables. This form allows full generality in specifying various types of constraint. If certain bounds are not present, the associated elements of ${l}_{x}$ or ${u}_{x}$ may be set to special values that are treated as $-\infty$ or $+\infty$. See the description of the optional parameter ${\mathbf{Infinite Bound Size}}$ of the solvers in the suite, nag_opt_handle_solve_ipopt (e04stc) and nag_opt_handle_solve_pennon (e04svc). Its value is denoted as $\mathit{bigbnd}$ further in this text. Note that the bounds are interpreted based on its value at the time of calling this function and any later alterations to ${\mathbf{Infinite Bound Size}}$ will not affect these constraints.
See nag_opt_handle_init (e04rac) for more details.

## 4  References

Candes E and Recht B (2009) Exact matrix completion via convex optimization Foundations of Computation Mathematics (Volume 9) 717–772

## 5  Arguments

1:    $\mathbf{handle}$void *Input
On entry: the handle to the problem. It needs to be initialized by nag_opt_handle_init (e04rac) and must not be changed.
2:    $\mathbf{nvar}$IntegerInput
On entry: $n$, the number of decision variables $x$ in the problem. It must be unchanged from the value set during the initialization of the handle by nag_opt_handle_init (e04rac).
3:    $\mathbf{bl}\left[{\mathbf{nvar}}\right]$const doubleInput
4:    $\mathbf{bu}\left[{\mathbf{nvar}}\right]$const doubleInput
On entry: ${l}_{x}$, bl and ${u}_{x}$, bu define lower and upper bounds on the variables, respectively. To specify a nonexistent lower bound (i.e., ${l}_{j}=-\infty$), set ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[j-1\right]\le -\mathit{bigbnd}$; to specify a nonexistent upper bound (i.e., ${u}_{j}=\infty$), set ${\mathbf{bu}}\left[j-1\right]\ge \mathit{bigbnd}$. Fixing of the variables is not allowed in this release, however, this limitation will be removed in a future release.
Constraints:
• ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[\mathit{j}-1\right]<{\mathbf{bu}}\left[\mathit{j}-1\right]$, for $\mathit{j}=1,2,\dots ,{\mathbf{nvar}}$;
• ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[\mathit{j}-1\right]<\mathit{bigbnd}$, for $\mathit{j}=1,2,\dots ,{\mathbf{nvar}}$;
• ${\mathbf{bu}}\left[\mathit{j}-1\right]>-\mathit{bigbnd}$, for $\mathit{j}=1,2,\dots ,{\mathbf{nvar}}$.
5:    $\mathbf{fail}$NagError *Input/Output
The NAG error argument (see Section 2.7 in How to Use the NAG Library and its Documentation).

## 6  Error Indicators and Warnings

NE_ALLOC_FAIL
Dynamic memory allocation failed.
See Section 2.3.1.2 in How to Use the NAG Library and its Documentation for further information.
Variable bounds have already been defined.
On entry, argument $〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$ had an illegal value.
NE_BOUND
On entry, $j=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[j-1\right]=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, $\mathit{bigbnd}=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$.
Constraint: ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[j-1\right]<\mathit{bigbnd}$.
On entry, $j=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[j-1\right]=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$ and ${\mathbf{bu}}\left[j-1\right]=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$.
Constraint: ${\mathbf{bl}}\left[j-1\right]<{\mathbf{bu}}\left[j-1\right]$.
On entry, $j=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, ${\mathbf{bu}}\left[j-1\right]=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, $\mathit{bigbnd}=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$.
Constraint: ${\mathbf{bu}}\left[j-1\right]>-\mathit{bigbnd}$.
NE_HANDLE
The supplied handle does not define a valid handle to the data structure for the NAG optimization modelling suite. It has not been initialized by nag_opt_handle_init (e04rac) or it has been corrupted.
NE_INTERNAL_ERROR
An internal error has occurred in this function. Check the function call and any array sizes. If the call is correct then please contact NAG for assistance.
See Section 2.7.6 in How to Use the NAG Library and its Documentation for further information.
NE_NO_LICENCE
Your licence key may have expired or may not have been installed correctly.
See Section 2.7.5 in How to Use the NAG Library and its Documentation for further information.
NE_PHASE
The problem cannot be modified in this phase any more, the solver has already been called.
NE_REF_MATCH
On entry, ${\mathbf{nvar}}=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$, expected $\mathrm{value}=〈\mathit{\text{value}}〉$.
Constraint: nvar must match the value given during initialization of handle.

Not applicable.

## 8  Parallelism and Performance

nag_opt_handle_set_simplebounds (e04rhc) is not threaded in any implementation.

None.

## 10  Example

There is a vast number of problems which can be reformulated as SDP. This example follows Candes and Recht (2009) to show how a rank minimization problem can be approximated by SDP. In addition, it demonstrates how to work with the monitor mode of nag_opt_handle_solve_pennon (e04svc).
The problem can be stated as follows: Let's have $m$ respondents answering $k$ questions where they express their preferences as a number between $0$ and $1$ or the question can be left unanswered. The task is to fill in the missing entries, i.e., to guess the unexpressed preferences. This problem falls into the category of matrix completion. The idea is to choose the missing entries to minimize the rank of the matrix as it is commonly believed that only a few factors contribute to an individual's tastes or preferences.
Rank minimization is in general NP-hard but it can be approximated by a heuristic, minimizing the nuclear norm of the matrix. The nuclear norm of a matrix is the sum of its singular values. A rank deficient matrix must have (several) zero singular values. Given the fact that the singular values are always non-negative, a minimization of the nuclear norm has the same effect as ${\ell }_{1}$ norm in compress sensing, i.e., it encourages many singular values to be zero and thus it can be considered as a heuristic for the original rank minimization problem.
Let $\stackrel{^}{Y}$ denote the partially filled in $m×k$ matrix with the valid responses on $\left(i,j\right)\in \Omega$ positions. We are looking for $Y$ of the same size so that the valid responses are unchanged and the nuclear norm (denoted here as ${‖·‖}_{*}$) is minimal.
 $minimizeY Y* subject to Yij = Y^ij for all i,j∈Ω.$
This is equivalent to
 $minimize W1, W2, Y trace W1+ trace W2 subject to Yij = Y^ij for all i,j∈Ω W1 Y YT W2 ⪰ 0$
which is the linear semidefinite problem solved in this example, see Candes and Recht (2009) and the references therein for details.
This example has $m=15$ respondents and $k=6$ answers. The obtained answers are
 $Y^ = * * * * * 0.4 0.6 0.4 0.8 * * * * * 0.8 * 0.2 * 0.8 0.2 * * * * * 0.4 * 0.0 * 0.2 0.4 * * 0.2 * 0.2 * 0.8 0.2 0.6 * * * * 0.2 * * * * 0.4 * 0.6 0.0 * * * 0.4 * * * * * 0.2 0.2 0.4 0.4 * * * * 1.0 0.8 1.0 * 0.2 * * 0.6 * * * * * 0.2 0.6 * 0.2 0.4 * *$
where $*$ denotes missing entries ($-1.0$ is used instead in the data file). The obtained matrix has rank $4$ and it is shown below printed to $1$-digit accuracy:
 $Y = 0.5 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.4 0.4 0.6 0.4 0.8 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.4 0.3 0.8 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.8 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.3 0.4 0.0 0.4 0.2 0.0 0.2 0.2 0.4 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.1 0.2 0.6 0.8 0.2 0.6 0.2 0.4 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.6 0.4 0.1 0.6 0.0 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.4 0.0 0.1 0.1 0.5 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.4 0.4 0.7 0.4 0.3 0.0 1.0 0.8 1.0 0.3 0.2 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.6 0.3 0.2 0.4 0.2 0.3 .$
The example also turns on monitor mode of nag_opt_handle_solve_pennon (e04svc), there is a time limit introduced for the solver which is being checked at the end of every outer iteration. If the time limit is reached, the routine is stopped by setting ${\mathbf{inform}}=0$ within the monitor step.

### 10.1  Program Text

Program Text (e04rhce.c)

### 10.2  Program Data

Program Data (e04rhce.d)

### 10.3  Program Results

Program Results (e04rhce.r)