Introduction to xplus

In xplus: Positive and Unlabeled Learning from Unbalanced Cases and Sparse Structures

knitr::opts_chunk$set(collapse = TRUE, comment = "#>")

What is PU learning?

Positive and Unlabeled (PU) learning addresses settings where only positives are labeled, and the remaining data are unlabeled (not guaranteed negatives).

When to use xplus

xplus provides PLUS-derived extensions for confirmed-positive/unlabeled data and sparse feature models. The 1.0.0 development candidate does not guarantee calibrated probabilities or establish predictive superiority. Fitting requires finite numeric features (at least two columns) and at least three known positives and three unlabeled observations. learning_rate must be in (0, 1].

Basic workflow

library(xplus)
set.seed(1)
x <- matrix(rnorm(200 * 10), ncol = 10)
y <- c(rep(1, 40), rep(0, 160))

fit <- xplus(x, y, max_iter = 20, seed = 42)
summary(fit)
fit$stop_reason
fit$fallback_used
head(predict(fit, x, type = "response"))
levels(predict(fit, x, type = "class"))

The default uses weighted bootstrap multiplicities on unique CV rows and cv_measure = "deviance" in both fitting stages. sampling = "unique" opts into legacy deduplication. An explicit seed restores the caller's RNG state. max_iter is a limit, not a convergence claim: stability requires a full consecutive window and sampling coverage. Inspect stopping and fallback metadata.

Model assessment

These are training PU-label diagnostics on random features, not held-out true-class performance. Use independently established test labels for the latter. get_auc() forwards a single penalty selection to prediction.

metrics <- assess(fit, newx = x, newy = y, s = "lambda.1se")
metrics$auc
get_auc(fit, newx = x, newy = y, s = "lambda.1se")

Assessment accepts finite binary truth or two-column negative/positive masses for soft truth; soft vectors are not binary truth. Weights must be finite, nonnegative and exactly row-aligned. Invalid rows are errors, not silently dropped data. Undefined AUC warns and returns NA. MSE and MAE sum both class columns (twice scalar binary loss); deviance clips probabilities to [1e-5, 1 - 1e-5].

xplus documentation built on Sept. 26, 2026, 5:07 p.m.