voptimize: Vectorised One Dimensional Optimization

In rstpm2: Smooth Survival Models, Including Generalized Survival Models

Vectorised One Dimensional Optimization

Description

The function voptimize searches the interval from lower to upper for a minimum or maximum of the vectorised function f with respect to its first argument.

optimise is an alias for optimize.

Usage

voptimize(f, interval, ...,
          lower=pmin(interval[,1], interval[,2]),
          upper=pmax(interval[,1], interval[,2]),
          maximum = FALSE,
          tol = .Machine$double.eps^0.25)
voptimise(f, interval, ...,
          lower=pmin(interval[,1], interval[,2]),
          upper=pmax(interval[,1], interval[,2]),
          maximum = FALSE,
          tol = .Machine$double.eps^0.25)

Arguments

f	the function to be optimized. The function is either minimized or maximized over its first argument depending on the value of maximum.
interval	a matrix with two columns containing the end-points of the interval to be searched for the minimum.
...	additional named or unnamed arguments to be passed to f
lower, upper	the lower and upper end points of the interval to be searched.
maximum	logical. Should we maximize or minimize (the default)?
tol	the desired accuracy.

Details

Note that arguments after ... must be matched exactly.

The method used is a combination of golden section search and successive parabolic interpolation, and was designed for use with continuous functions. Convergence is never much slower than that for a Fibonacci search. If f has a continuous second derivative which is positive at the minimum (which is not at lower or upper), then convergence is superlinear, and usually of the order of about 1.324.

The function f is never evaluated at two points closer together than \epsilon |x_0| + (tol/3), where \epsilon is approximately sqrt(.Machine$double.eps) and x_0 is the final abscissa optimize()$minimum.
If f is a unimodal function and the computed values of f are always unimodal when separated by at least \epsilon |x| + (tol/3), then x_0 approximates the abscissa of the global minimum of f on the interval lower,upper with an error less than \epsilon |x_0|+ tol.
If f is not unimodal, then optimize() may approximate a local, but perhaps non-global, minimum to the same accuracy.

The first evaluation of f is always at x_1 = a + (1-\phi)(b-a) where (a,b) = (lower, upper) and \phi = (\sqrt 5 - 1)/2 = 0.61803.. is the golden section ratio. Almost always, the second evaluation is at x_2 = a + \phi(b-a). Note that a local minimum inside [x_1,x_2] will be found as solution, even when f is constant in there, see the last example.

f will be called as f(x, ...) for a numeric value of x.

The argument passed to f has special semantics and used to be shared between calls. The function should not copy it.

The implementation is a vectorised version of the optimize function.

Value

A list with components minimum (or maximum) and objective which give the location of the minimum (or maximum) and the value of the function at that point.

Source

Based on R's C translation of Fortran code https://netlib.org/fmm/fmin.f (author(s) unstated) based on the Algol 60 procedure localmin given in the reference.

References

Brent, R. (1973) Algorithms for Minimization without Derivatives. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

See Also

optimize for the standard single optimiser solver, nlm, uniroot.

Examples

library(graphics)

f <- function (x, a) (x - a)^2
xmin <- voptimize(f, lower=c(0, 0), upper=c(1,1), tol = 0.0001, a = c(1/3,2/3))
xmin

## See where the function is evaluated:
voptimize(function(x) x^2*(print(x)-1), lower = c(0,0), upper = c(10,10))

## "wrong" solution with unlucky interval and piecewise constant f():
f  <- function(x) ifelse(x > -1, ifelse(x < 4, exp(-1/abs(x - 1)), 10), 10)
fp <- function(x) { print(x); f(x) }

plot(f, -2,5, ylim = 0:1, col = 2)
voptimize(fp, cbind(-4, 20))   # doesn't see the minimum
voptimize(fp, cbind(-7, 20))   # ok

rstpm2 documentation built on Aug. 28, 2025, 1:10 a.m.