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by black_puppydog 871 days ago
It's quite easy to go tell other people what they should do with their time.

These researchers are in the business of improving algorithms. Implementing them in large industrial (or open source) code bases in a maintainable way -- and then actually maintaining that code -- is a different skillset, a different set of interestes, and as was pointed out, besides the point.

Either you believe their results, then be grateful. Someone (yoU!) can implement this. Or you don't. In which case, feel free to move on.

Your tone comes off as entitled.
2 comments
bnegreve 871 days ago
> Implementing them in large industrial (or open source) code bases in a maintainable way -- and then actually maintaining that code -- is a different skillset, a different set of interestes,

You're making a very general point on how algorithm research and software development are two different things, which is of course true. However OP's question is genuine: a lot of research in OR is very practical, and researchers often hack solvers to demonstrate that whatever idea offers a benefit over existing solving techniques. There are no reason to believe that a good new idea like this one couldn't be demonstrated and incorporated into new solvers quickly (especially given the competition).

So the quoted sentence is indeed a bit mysterious. I think it just meant to avoid comment such as "if it's so good why isn't it used in cplex?".

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imtringued 871 days ago
>business of improving algorithms

You do realize that the solver companies are in exactly the same boat, right?

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black_puppydog 871 days ago
no they're not. they're in the business of making their customers' problems solve fast and well. That's of course strongly related, but it is _not_ the same. An algorithm may well be (and this is what OP might be hinting at) be more elegant and efficient, but execute worse on actually existing hardware.
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benterix 871 days ago
And given how much the licenses cost, I'd love a new player to show up and bring them down to a reasonable level.
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aleph_minus_one 870 days ago
Since version 8.0.3, SCIP is available under Apache 2.0 License:

> https://www.scipopt.org/index.php#news

So the new player to show up is here. :-)

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