How to change Options of PSO during iterations?

Hi there,

Is there a way to change the options used in PSO during the iterations?

The reason is I try to do more of a explorative search (using smaller 'SocialAdjustmentWeight' and smaller 'MinNeighborsFraction' values) during the first few iterations of the PSO and then go for a more exploitative search with comparatively larger values for both mentioned parameters.

I tried creating two seperate PSO runs where each PSO has mentioned options set as per requirement. Then pass the best solution found during the first PSO to the second PSO as initial matrix ('InitialSwarmMatrix'). But I think this way the second PSO has to start everything from begining on the search (kind of), so if I can alter the options during the iterations that way it might give better results.

Any suggestions mostly welcome!

thanks in advance

Answer 1

[John D'Errico]

Sorry, but no. You cannot change the options for a solver in the middle of the solve. This is essentially true for any solver. (Allowing the options to change arbitrarily in mid-stride would result in the code from hell to write. Not gonna happen.)

You can allow the solver to terminate at some point, then restart it as a new problem from that point, then with new options.

[Buddhi Wimarshana]

many thanks @John D'Errico. I started doing the same as you suggested, re-start the solver with the changed conditions each time.