Types of search strategies

• Breadth-first search
• Uniform-cost search
• Depth-first search
Uninformed • Depth-limited search
• Iterative deepening depth-first search
search
• Bidirectional search

• Greedy best-first search

• A* search
Informed • Memory-bounded heuristic search
search

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Informed Search strategies

• Additional information about the states beyond the

problem definition.
• Uses Problem-specific knowledge to find more
efficient solutions.
• Maintains a sort of internal states via heuristics
functions which provides hints.
 Types of search strategies

• Greedy best-first search

• A* search
Informed
search
• Memory-bounded heuristic search
 Greedy Best-First Search ( GBFS )
• Idea: use an evaluation function f(n) for each node
– estimate of "desirability"
– Expand most desirable unexpanded node

• Implementation: use a data structure that maintains the frontier in a decreasing

order of desirability
• Is it really the best?

• Special cases: uniform-cost (Dijkstra’s algorithm), greedy search, A* search

• Heuristic function h(n) – Key Component

– h(n) = estimated cost of the cheapest path from node n to a goal node
– h(n) = 0 if n is the goal
– h(n) could be general or problem-specific
 GBFS Algorithm

1. Initialize the Q with the starting state (node)

2. While Q is not empty, do
1. Assign the first element of Q to N
2. If N is the goal, return SUCCESS
3. Remove N from Q
4. Add the children of N to Q
5. Sort the entire Q by f (n)
3. Return FAILURE
 Recall Romania Map Example

What’s a proper heuristic that measures cheapest path from current node to goal node?
 Romania Map with Costs

Evaluation function: f(n) = h(n)

▪ estimate the cost from n to goal
h(n)=hSLD => straight line distance from n to Bucharest
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (gbfs)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (gbfs)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (gbfs)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (gbfs)
 Analysis of Greedy Best-First search

• Complete?
– From Iasi to Fagaras
– No – can get stuck in loops, e.g., Iasi 🡪 Neamt 🡪 Iasi 🡪Neamt 🡪 …
• Time?
– O(bm), but a good heuristic can give dramatic improvement
• Space?
– O(bm) -- keeps all nodes in memory
• Optimal?
– No
 A*: Minimizing Total Est. Cost
• Name Reason

• Idea: avoid expanding paths that are already expensive.

• Evaluation function f (n) = g(n) + h(n)

– g (n) = cost so far to reach n

– h (n) = estimated cost from n to goal

– f (n) = estimated total cost of path through n to goal

Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (a* search)
 Analysis of A* search
• Important idea:
– Appropriate h(n) function
– A* is optimal efficient (no other optimal alg. Can expand fewer nodes than A*)
– Pruning while still guaranteeing optimality
• Complete?
– Yes (unless there are infinitely many nodes with f ≤ f(G))
• Optimal?
– Yes, with finite b and positive path cost
• However, A* is not the answer for all problems
• Time?
– Exponential in the length of the solution
• Space?
– Keeps all nodes in memory & usually runs out of space long before it runs out of time
 Heuristics h(n) for A*

Two commonly used functions:

▪ h1(n) = number of misplaced tiles
e.g., h1(n) = 8

▪ h2 (n) = sum of the distances of the tiles from their goal positions,
called Manhattan distance
e.g., h2 (n) = 3 + 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 3 + 2 =
18
 Memory bounded heuristic search

• Recursive Best-First Search

• Iterative Deepening A* search
Memory • Simple Memory-bound A* search
Bounded Search
 Recursive Best-First Search (RBFS)

• Similar to A* algorithm developed for heuristic search

• Difference lies in their memory capability
– A* keeps in memory all the nodes that are generated.
– RBFS keeps only the current search path and the sibling nodes along the path
• Suspends the search of subtree when it no longer looks the best
• When it suspends, it forgets the subtree to save space
 Recursive Best-First Search (RBFS)

• Space complexity is linear to the depth of the search tree

• Mimics Best-First Search
• Keeps track of the f-value of the best alternative path available from any
ancestor of the current node.
• If current node exceed the limit , then the alternative path is explored.
• Remembers the best f-value of the leaf in the forgotten subtree.
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (rbfs search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (rbfs search)
Arad 🡪 Bucharest (rbfs search)
 CONSTRAINT SATISFACTION PROBLEM

2/12/2024 20CS208 INTELLIGENT AGENT 28

 CONSTRAINT SATISFACTION PROBLEM
(CSP)
• Constraint satisfaction is a technique where a problem is solved when its values satisfy
certain constraints or rules of the problem. Such type of technique leads to a deeper
understanding of the problem structure as well as its complexity.

• Constraint satisfaction depends on three components, namely:

• X: It is a set of variables.
• D: It is a set of domains where the variables reside. There is a specific domain for each
variable.
• C: It is a set of constraints which are followed by the set of variables.

• The constraint value consists of a pair of {scope, rel}.

• The scope is a tuple of variables which participate in the constraint and rel is a relation
which includes a list of values which the variables can take to satisfy the constraints of the
problem.
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 SOLVING CSP PROBLEM
• The requirements to solve a constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) is:
• A state-space
• The notion of the solution.
• A state in state-space is defined by assigning values to some or all variables such as
{X1=v1, X2=v2, and so on…}.

• An assignment of values to a variable can be done in three ways:

• Consistent or Legal Assignment: An assignment which does not violate any constraint or
rule is called Consistent or legal assignment.
• Complete Assignment: An assignment where every variable is assigned with a value, and the
solution to the CSP remains consistent. Such assignment is known as Complete assignment.
• Partial Assignment: An assignment which assigns values to some of the variables only. Such
type of assignments are called Partial assignments.
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 DOMAINS & CONSTRAINTS IN CSP
There are following two types of domains which are used by the variables :
• Discrete Domain: It is an infinite domain which can have one state for multiple variables. For
example, a start state can be allocated infinite times for each variable.
• Finite Domain: It is a finite domain which can have continuous states describing one domain for
one specific variable. It is also called a continuous domain.

With respect to the variables, basically there are following types of constraints:
• Unary Constraints: It is the simplest type of constraints that restricts the value of a single variable.
e.g., SA ≠ green
• Binary Constraints: It is the constraint type which relates two variables. A value x2 will contain a
value which lies between x1 and x3. e.g., SA ≠ WA
• Global Constraints: It is the constraint type which involves an arbitrary number of variables.

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 MAP COLORING USING CSP

Variables: X = {WA, NT, Q, NSW, V, SA, T }

Domains: Di = {red, green, blue}

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Constraints: Adjacent regions must have different colors 32
 MAP COLORING USING CSP

Variables: X = {WA, NT, Q, NSW, V, SA, T }

Domains: Di = {red, green, blue}
Constraints: Adjacent regions must have different colors
Solution: {WA = red, NT = green, Q = red, NSW = green, V = red, SA = blue, T = red}.

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 CONSTRAINT GRAPH - CSP

▪ Constraint graph: nodes are variables, arcs are

constraints
▪ Binary CSP: each constraint relates two variables
▪ CSP conforms to a standard pattern
▪ a set of variables with assigned values
▪ generic successor function and goal test
▪ generic heuristics
▪ reduce complexity

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 CSP AS A SEARCH PROBLEM
• Initial state:
• {} – all variables are unassigned
• Successor function:
• a value is assigned to one of the unassigned variables with no conflict
• Goal test:
• a complete assignment
• Path cost:
• a constant cost for each step
• Solution:
• Appears at depth n if there are n variables
• Depth-first or local search methods work well
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 CSP SOLVERS

▪ CSP solver can quickly eliminate large part of search space

▪ If {SA = blue}
▪ Then 35 assignments can be reduced to 25
assignments, a reduction of 87%

▪ In a CSP, if a partial assignment is not a solution, we can

immediately discard further refinements of it

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 GLOBAL CONSTRAINTS- CRYPTARITHMETIC

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GLOBAL CONSTRAINTS- CRYPTARITHMETIC
• SOLVE:
S E N D
+ M O R E
----------------------------------
M O N E Y

B A S E
+ B A L L
-------------------------------------
G A M E S
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 REAL WORLD CSP

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 BACKTRACKING - CSP

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 BACKTRACKING - CSP

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 BACKTRACKING - CSP

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 BACKTRACKING - CSP

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 BACKTRACKING - CSP

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 IMPROVING BACKTRACKING EFFICIENCY

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 Forward checking

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 Constraint propagation

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THANK YOU