[SciPy-user] Nonlinear Constraint Optimization.

Thu Jan 10 08:54:05 EST 2002

I've a nonlinear optimal (trajectory) control problem to solve and have
looked around for public domain (C++) code. The best I could find was
Omuses (time-continuous front end) that is based on HQP ("Huge"
sequential "Quadratic" "Program"/solver that can directly be used for
time-discrete problems; it employes sparsity using the sparse meschach
code which is in C).

Solving a system with Omuses/HQP involves writing a class (that inherits
from Omuses_Problem or HQP_Problem) with a set of differential (or
difference) equations in C++, linking them with the library; the
solution process is initialized/controled with Tcl scripts.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if this all could be done from within a Python
environment? To that end, the following Python interfaces should be
available:

1. One to meschach, and the partially implemented C++ interface,
meschach++, may work as a start;
2. One to the Hqp_Program class;
3. One to the Hqp_SeqProgram class;
4. One to the Omuses_Program class;

I've tried to make a start with meschach using SWIG which is geared
towards C, creating functions that can be wrapped by shadow classes in
Python. However, the boost.python library also provides an "interface
builder" which provides a tighter coupling between C/C++ and Python.

After a while, I had to give up, because I feel I'm lacking the
experience to make the correct decisions. Preferably, I would team up
with other people that may be interested and join into a shared project
in which we can share ideas and build things quicker.

Are there people interested? I'm open to all ideas.

Kind regards,

Henk Jansen.

HQP link:	http://www.systemtechnik.tu-ilmenau.de/~fg_opt/omuses/hqp.html
Omuses link:
http://www.systemtechnik.tu-ilmenau.de/~fg_opt/omuses/omuses.html