Computing
COIN-OR Grows in 2009
— Submitted by Matthew Saltzman
The COmputational INfrastructure for Operations Research (COIN-OR) is an organization of volunteers devoted to creating and disseminating open-source software for the operations research community. Hosted by INFORMS, COIN-ORs Web site is currently home to more than 30 projects and a burgeoning community of developers and users. COIN-OR supports development and use of open-source software by providing extensive tools and infrastructure for collaborative project development. For more information about COIN-OR's history, goals and projects, see "COIN-OR Pays Off" (OR/MS Today, October 2005) or visit www.coin-or.org. This article highlights 2009 accomplishments and our plans for the INFORMS Annual Meeting in San Diego.
The year 2009 has been an active one for COIN-OR on many fronts. These are just a few of the achievements of the COIN-OR community.
New Developments in 2009
New projects that went live in 2009 include LEMON, a library of C++ classes for graph and network optimization; ADOL-C, an automatic differentiation library for C and C++; and METSlib, a library for developing metaheuristics.
Optimization Services (OS) now supports the Couenne MINLP solver and offers APIs for solver options and results. OS is now available in a binary distribution for Windows.
A Google Summer of Code project integrated Ipopt with the ASCEND modeling environment to produce an integrated open-source environment for modeling and solving NLPs.
The COIN-OR Strategic Leadership Board has made significant progress in revising the legal policies and procedures for projects. The Technical Leadership Council is developing new infrastructure and build procedures for the projects that use our BuildTools support.
New Users
Kipp Martin (Optimization Services project manager) is using BCP to schedule medical services and campus bus routes.
Projects at Queens University use CLP and CBC for cargo revenue management and DFO and Ipopt to solve a dynamic pricing problem.
The Brazilian company VRTech uses Ipopt and BonMin in their EMSO simulation/optimization system and their RECOVR wastewater management tool.
CSDP is integrated in the HOL-Light theorem-proving system and is now supported in R.
Even in this brief list of activities, it is apparent that COIN-OR's impact on the field of computational O.R. is wide ranging. COIN-OR software is used in research projects and in production systems. Developers and users in the broader community as well as COIN-OR developers are using COIN-OR tools to advance and exploit the state of the art of computational operations research.
COIN-OR at INFORMS San Diego
COIN-OR is planning several events for the 2009 INFORMS Annual Meeting Oct. 11-14 in San Diego. For information and details, see https://projects.coin-or.org/Events/wiki/InformsSd or the "Events" link at www.coin-or.org.
2009 COIN-OR INFORMS Cup Competition. The fourth annual COIN-OR INFORMS Cup Competition is underway. Rules for the "most coveted prize in computational O.R." are available at www.coin-or.org/coinCup/coinCup09.html. The Cup Chair will award the prize on Oct. 12. All are invited to attend the Cup celebration.
Technical Program. Several COIN-OR-related presentations are scheduled during the San Diego conference Oct. 11-14. Join COIN-OR developers and board members at the COIN-OR Technology Forum for an open discussion of COIN-OR projects and plans (Oct. 13, 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m.). A session on bi-level integer programming features the CHiPPS MIP solver framework (Oct 12, 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m.). Sessions on applications of COIN-OR software will be held Oct. 12, 1:30-3 p.m. and 4:30-6:00 p.m. A number of other presentations feature open-source software or examine the open-source process, including a tutorial by Robin Lougee-Heimer on open-source concepts and developments (Oct. 11, 8-9:30 a.m.). Andreas Wachter (Ipopt project manager) and his co-author won the 2009 INFORMS Computing Society Prize. See the prize presentations on Oct 11, 1:30-3 p.m.
COIN-OR Members and Users Meeting. The Members and Users Meeting of COIN-OR Foundation will be led by Bob Fourer (Northwestern University) during lunch on Oct. 12. Anyone interested in COIN-OR business, open-source software tools, open standards, and data and model repositories for any aspect of O.R. is encouraged to attend.
Visit COIN-OR in the exhibit area. Once again this year, thanks to INFORMS for allowing us to exhibit. Stop by the booth to ask questions, get assistance and meet members of the open-source community.
Attend the INFORMS Computing Society Business Meeting. As part of the strategic partnership between the INFORMS Computing Society and the COIN-OR Foundation, a brief update on update on COIN-OR will be presented during the Computing Society Business Meeting on Oct. 12. Wine and cheese will be served.
Need code? Got code? Get involved. We look forward to seeing you in San Diego!
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