PROC NLP: Finite-Difference Approximations of Derivatives :: SAS/OR(R) 9.22 User's Guide: Mathematical Programming

The NLP Procedure

Finite-Difference Approximations of Derivatives

The FD= and FDHESSIAN= options specify the use of finite-difference approximations of the derivatives. The FD= option specifies that all derivatives are approximated using function evaluations, and the FDHESSIAN= option specifies that second-order derivatives are approximated using gradient evaluations.

Computing derivatives by finite-difference approximations can be very time-consuming, especially for second-order derivatives based only on values of the objective function ( FD= option). If analytical derivatives are difficult to obtain (for example, if a function is computed by an iterative process), you might consider one of the optimization techniques that uses first-order derivatives only (TECH=QUANEW, TECH=DBLDOG, or TECH=CONGRA).

Forward-Difference Approximations

The forward-difference derivative approximations consume less computer time but are usually not as precise as those using central-difference formulas.

First-order derivatives: $\text{[math]}$ additional function calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$
Second-order derivatives based on function calls only (Dennis and Schnabel 1983, p. 80, 104): for dense Hessian, $\text{[math]}$ additional function calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$
Second-order derivatives based on gradient calls (Dennis and Schnabel 1983, p. 103): $\text{[math]}$ additional gradient calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$

Central-Difference Approximations

First-order derivatives: $\text{[math]}$ additional function calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$
Second-order derivatives based on function calls only (Abramowitz and Stegun 1972, p. 884): for dense Hessian, $\text{[math]}$ additional function calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$ $\text{[math]}$ $\text{[math]}$
$\text{[math]}$ $\text{[math]}$ $\text{[math]}$
Second-order derivatives based on gradient: $\text{[math]}$ additional gradient calls are needed:

$\text{[math]}$

The FDIGITS= and CDIGITS= options can be used for specifying the number of accurate digits in the evaluation of objective function and nonlinear constraints. These specifications are helpful in determining an appropriate interval length $\text{[math]}$ to be used in the finite-difference formulas.

The FDINT= option specifies whether the finite-difference intervals $\text{[math]}$ should be computed using an algorithm of Gill, Murray, Saunders, and Wright (1983) or based only on the information of the FDIGITS= and CDIGITS= options. For FDINT=OBJ, the interval $\text{[math]}$ is based on the behavior of the objective function; for FDINT=CON, the interval $\text{[math]}$ is based on the behavior of the nonlinear constraints functions; and for FDINT=ALL, the interval $\text{[math]}$ is based on the behaviors of both the objective function and the nonlinear constraints functions. Note that the algorithm of Gill, Murray, Saunders, and Wright (1983) to compute the finite-difference intervals $\text{[math]}$ can be very expensive in the number of function calls. If the FDINT= option is specified, it is currently performed twice, the first time before the optimization process starts and the second time after the optimization terminates.

If FDINT= is not specified, the step lengths $\text{[math]}$ , $\text{[math]}$ , are defined as follows:

for the forward-difference approximation of first-order derivatives using function calls and second-order derivatives using gradient calls: $\text{[math]}$ ,
for the forward-difference approximation of second-order derivatives that use only function calls and all central-difference formulas: $\text{[math]}$ ,

where $\text{[math]}$ is defined using the FDIGITS= option:

If the number of accurate digits is specified with FDIGITS= $\text{[math]}$ , $\text{[math]}$ is set to $\text{[math]}$ .
If FDIGITS= is not specified, $\text{[math]}$ is set to the machine precision $\text{[math]}$ .

For FDINT=OBJ and FDINT=ALL, the FDIGITS= specification is used in computing the forward and central finite-difference intervals.

If the problem has nonlinear constraints and the FD= option is specified, the first-order formulas are used to compute finite-difference approximations of the Jacobian matrix $\text{[math]}$ . You can use the CDIGITS= option to specify the number of accurate digits in the constraint evaluations to define the step lengths $\text{[math]}$ , $\text{[math]}$ . For FDINT=CON and FDINT=ALL, the CDIGITS= specification is used in computing the forward and central finite-difference intervals.

Note:If you are unable to specify analytic derivatives and the finite-difference approximations provided by PROC NLP are not good enough to solve your problem, you may program better finite-difference approximations using the GRADIENT, JACOBIAN, CRPJAC, or HESSIAN statement and the program statements.

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