COPT

Cardinal Optimizer by Cardinal Operations is a solver for linear programming problems (LPs) and mixed-integer linear programming problems (MIPs).

Usage

A GAMS/COPT or GAMS/COPT-Link license is required to use the GAMS/COPT interface that is distributed with GAMS. If only a GAMS/COPT-Link license is available, also a separate COPT license needs to be installed on the system, see the "Cardinal Operations User Guide" for details.

The following statement can be used inside your GAMS program to specify using COPT

Option MIP = COPT;     { or LP, RMIP }


The above statement should appear before the Solve statement. If COPT was specified as the default solver during GAMS installation, the above statement is not necessary.

COPT supports special ordered sets (SOS), but no semicontinuous or semiinteger variables.

Specification of COPT Options

The following GAMS parameters are currently supported by GAMS/COPT: reslim, iterlim, nodlim, optcr, optca, tryint, and threads.

Further options can be set via a solver options file, see Section The Solver Option File for further information. Following is an example options file copt.opt:

TreeCutLevel 0
SimplexThreads 4


It will cause COPT to use cut generators only in the root node (for a MIP solve) and specifies to use 4 threads in the simplex algorithm.

Specification of Indicators

Indicators are a modeling tool to specify that certain equations in a model must only be satisfied if certain binary variables take a specified value. Indicators are not supported by the GAMS language, but can be passed to COPT via a GAMS/COPT solver options file, see Indicator Constraints for more details on its syntax.

MIP Starting Point

When solving a MIP, by default all values that are specified as variable levels in the GAMS model are passed as starting point to COPT. However, if GAMS option tryint is set to a nonzero value, then only values of binary and integer variables which fractionality is at most the value tryint are passed as starting point to COPT. COPT will then try to complete this partial solution to a feasible solution.

Solution Pool

When COPT solves a problem, it may find several solutions, whereof only the best one is available to the GAMS user via the variable level values in the GAMS model. If the option solnpool is specified, then all alternative solutions found by COPT are written into GDX files and an index file with the name given by the this option is written. If the option solnpoolmerge is specified, then all alternative solutions found by COPT are written into a single GDX file, which name is given by the this option.

The GAMS testlib model dumpsol shows an example use for this option.

Finding an Irreducible Inconsistent Subsystem (IIS) of Constraints

If COPT declares an LP or MIP as infeasible, it has the capability to identify a subset of the constraints that are infeasible and become feasible once any one of them is eliminated. Option iis can be used to enable finding an IIS.

As an example, consider a GAMS model containing

Positive Variables x, y;
Equation e1;
e1.. x + y =l= -1;


The corresponding COPT output when iis has been enabled will look like

Starting the simplex solver using 1 thread

Method   Iteration           Objective  Primal.NInf   Dual.NInf        Time
Dual             0    0.0000000000e+00            1           0       0.00s

Solving finished
Status: Infeasible  Objective: -  Iterations: 0  Time: 0.00s
Start the IIS computation for an LP

Iteration  Min RowBnd  Max RowBnd  Min ColBnd  Max ColBnd      Time
0           0           1           0           2      0.00s
1           0           1           0           2      0.00s
2           1           1           0           2      0.00s
3           1           1           1           2      0.00s
4           1           1           2           2      0.00s

IIS summary: 1 rows, 2 bounds of columns
IIS computation finished (0.000s)
IIS is minimal
Number of equations in IIS: 1
Upper: e1 <= -1
Number of variables in IIS: 2
Lower: x >= 0
Lower: y >= 0


That is, COPT finds the problem infeasible. Then the IIS computation is started and an IIS is found. The IIS is then printed to the log and listing file. It consists of the lower bounds of variables x and y and equation e1. This suggests that the entire model can be made feasible by lowering the lower bound of x or y or by increasing the right-hand side of e1.

List of COPT Options

In the following, we give a detailed list of available COPT options.

Limits and Tolerances

Option Description Default
BarIterLimit Barrier iteration limit
Range: {0, ..., ∞}
GAMS iterlim
DualTol The tolerance for dual solutions and reduced cost
Range: [1e-09, 0.0001]
1e-06
FeasTol The feasibility tolerance
Range: [1e-09, 0.0001]
1e-06
IntTol The integer feasibility tolerance
Range: [1e-09, 0.1]
1e-06
MatrixTol The input matrix coefficient tolerance
Range: [0, 1e-07]
1e-10
NodeLimit Limit of nodes for MIP
Range: {-1, ..., ∞}
GAMS nodlim
RelGap The relative gap for MIP
Range: [0, ∞]
GAMS optcr
TimeLimit Time limit of the optimization
Range: [0, 1e+20]
GAMS reslim

Presolving and Scaling

Option Description Default
Dualize Whether to dualize a problem before solving it
-1: Choose automatically.
0: No dualizing.
1: Dualizing the problem.
-1
Presolve Whether to perform persolving before solving a problem
-1: Choose automatically.
0: No presolving.
1: Presolving the problem.
-1
Scaling Whether to perform scaling before solving a problem
-1: Choose automatically.
0: No scaling.
1: Apply scaling.
-1

LP solving

Option Description Default
BarHomogeneous Whether to use homogeneous self-dual form in barrier
-1: Choose automatically.
0: No.
1: Yes.
-1
BarOrder Barrier ordering algorithm
-1: Choose automatically.
0: Approximate Minimum Degree (AMD).
1: Nested Dissection (ND).
-1
DualPerturb Whether to allow the objective function perturbation
-1: Choose automatically.
0: No perturbation.
1: Allow objective function perturbation.
-1
DualPrice Specifies the dual simplex pricing algorithm
-1: Choose automatically.
0: Using Devex pricing algorithm.
1: Using dual steepest-edge pricing algorithm .
-1
LpMethod Specifies the LP method
-1: Choose automatically.
1: Dual simplex.
2: Barrier.
3: Crossover.
4: Concurrent (Use simplex and barrier simultaneously).
-1

MIP solving

Option Description Default
ConflictAnalysis Whether to perform conflict analysis
-1: Automatic.
0: No.
1: Yes.
-1
CutLevel Level of cutting planes generation
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
DivingHeurLevel Level of diving heuristics
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
HeurLevel Level of heuristics
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
NodeCutRounds Maximum cut rounds in a local node
Range: {-1, ..., ∞}
-1
RootCutLevel Level of root cutting planes generation
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
RootCutRounds Maximum cut rounds in the root (-1: unlimited)
Range: {-1, ..., ∞}
-1
RoundingHeurLevel Level of rounding heuristics
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
StrongBranching Level of strong branching
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
SubMipHeurLevel Level of sub-MIP heuristics
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1
TreeCutLevel Level of tree cutting planes generation
-1: Automatic.
0: Off.
1: Fast.
2: Normal.
3: Aggressive.
-1

Multithreading

Option Description Default
BarThreads Number of threads to use in the barrier solver
Range: {-1, ..., 128}
-1
CrossoverThreads Number of threads to use in the crossover
Range: {-1, ..., 128}
-1
MipTasks Number of MIP tasks in parallel (-1: automatic)
Range: {-1, ..., 255}
-1
SimplexThreads Number of threads to use in the simplex solver
Range: {-1, ..., 128}
-1
Threads Number of threads to use
Range: {-1, ..., 128}
GAMS threads

GAMS/COPT link

Option Description Default
iis whether to compute an Irreducible Inconsistent Subsystem (IIS) if the problem is infeasible
Range: boolean
0
readparams read COPT parameter file
Range: string
solnpool Solution pool file name
The name of a solutions index gdx file for writing alternate solutions found by COPT. The GDX file specified by this option will contain a set called index that contains the names of GDX files with the individual solutions.
Range: string
solnpoolmerge Solution pool file name for merged solutions
Range: string
solvefinal whether to solve the LP obtained from fixing discrete variables and variables in SOS after a MIP solve
If marginals are not accessed after a MIP solve, it is advised to disable this option.
Range: boolean
1
writebas name of file to which to write advanced starting basis in basis format
Range: string
writebin name of file to which to write problem in COPT binary format
Range: string
writelp name of file to which to write problem in LP file format
Range: string
writemps name of file to which to write problem in MPS file format
Range: string
writemst name of file to which to write MIP starting point
Range: string

Miscellaneous

Option Description Default
IISMethod Specifies the IIS method
-1: Automatic.
0: Find smaller IIS.
1: Find IIS quickly.
-1
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