Research::Projects::PLATON

PLATON (ParalleL Adaptive Techniques for OptimisatioN) is an open source Problem Solving Environment (PSE) for distributed numerical optimisation that allows the construction and computational steering of large-scale optimisation & simulation processes. The motivation for this project is to build an environment for the rapid prototyping and coupling of third party optimisers with associated numerical simulations (e.g. a FEM-program). Currently, PLATON includes various optimizers from Sandia's OPT++, a library of nonlinear optimization algorithms written in C++, from GAlib, a C++ Library of Genetic Algorithms, C++ Direct Searches, C++ class-based implementations of direct search methods. Between these optimizers, a wide range of problems can be solved, e.g. with or without constraints, with or without analytic gradients, Evolutionary strategies, Simplex algorithms, simulation based, etc.