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SUMMARY:Constraint Programming - Laura Nechita\, Newnham College
DTSTART:20160210T194000Z
DTEND:20160210T203000Z
UID:TALK62546@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Matthew Ireland
DESCRIPTION:Constraint programming (CP) is a form of declarative programmi
 ng which is used for solving large\, combinatorial problems especially in 
 areas of planning and scheduling. It consists of identifying feasible solu
 tions out of a very large set of candidate solutions\, where the problem c
 an be modeled in terms of arbitrary constraints. CP has many applications 
 in many different domains: computer graphics (to express geometric coheren
 ce in the case of scene analysis)\, natural language processing (e.g. cons
 truction of efficient parsers)\, database systems\, molecular biology (DNA
  sequencing)\, business\, etc. This talk will first introduce the basic no
 tions of CP and then focus on the solving aspect\, in particular\, symmetr
 y breaking\, consistency enforcement algorithms and global constraints. Sy
 mmetry breaking is a technique for reducing the search space\, but it reli
 es on the presence of symmetry in the solutions. Consistency enforcement\,
  on the other hand\, is an orthogonal technique that achieves the same goa
 l and is applicable to more general CSPs. Both of these techniques exploit
  special structures in CSPs to reduce solving time. An alternative approac
 h is to identify global constraints\, namely constraints that are present 
 and repeatedly used in a wide variety of constraint problems. We shall exp
 lore how the ideas of global constraints and special purpose consistency e
 nforcement can be combined to form the basis of efficient and modern const
 raint solvers.\n
LOCATION:Wolfson Hall\, Churchill College
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