Internet Info 1994 March/Internet Info CD-ROM (Walnut Creek) (March 1994).iso/answers/comp/ai-faq/genetic/part1

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From: [e-mail] (David Beasley)
Subject: FAQ: comp.ai.genetic part 1/6 (A Guide to Frequently Asked Questions)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Followup-To: comp.ai.genetic
Summary: This is part 1 of a <trilogy> entitled "The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to
         Evolutionary Computation". A periodically published list of
         Frequently Asked Questions (and their answers) about Evolutionary
         Algorithms, Life and Everything. It should be read by anyone who
         whishes to post to the comp.ai.genetic newsgroup, preferably *before*
         posting.
Originator: [e-mail] (David Beasley)
Sender: [e-mail] (David Beasley)
Supersedes: <[e-mail]>
Organization: University of Wales College of Cardiff, Cardiff, WALES, UK.
References: <[e-mail]>
Date: Fri, 18 Mar 94 15:18:38 GMT
Approved: [e-mail]
Expires: 30 Jun 1994 15:18:14 GMT
Lines: 512
Xref: bloom-beacon.mit.edu comp.ai.genetic:2504 comp.answers:4204 news.answers:16510

Archive-name:   ai-faq/genetic/part1
Last-Modified:  3/20/94
Issue:          2.1

                      The

                 Hitch-Hiker's


                    Guide to

               Evolutionary Computation

               (FAQ in comp.ai.genetic)

                   edited by

                   Joerg Heitkoetter
           c/o Systems Analysis Research Group, LSXI
            Department of Computer Science
                University of Dortmund
               D-44221 Dortmund, Germany
            <[e-mail]>
                 or <[e-mail]>

                      and

                 David Beasley
            c/o Department of Computing Mathematics
            University of Wales, College of Cardiff
                Cardiff, United Kingdom
              <[e-mail]>


                    PLEASE:
           Search this posting first if you have a question
                      and
       If someone else asks a question which is answered in here
            DON'T POST THE ANSWER TO THE NEWSGROUP:
              POINT THE ASKER TO THE FAQ

                      and


                  DON'T PANIC







     FAQ  /F-A-Q/  or  /fak/  [USENET] n.  1. A Frequently Asked Question.
      2. A compendium of  accumulated  lore,  posted  periodically  to
      high-volume   newsgroups   in   an  attempt  to  forestall  such
      questions.  Some people prefer the term  `FAQ  list'  or  `FAQL'
      /fa'kl/, reserving `FAQ' for sense 1.

     RTFAQ
      /R-T-F-A-Q/  [USENET:  primarily  written, by analogy with RTFM]
      imp. Abbrev. for `Read the FAQ!', an exhortation that the person
      addressed  ought to read the newsgroup's FAQ list before posting
      questions.
     RTFM /R-T-F-M/ [UNIX] imp. Acronym for `Read The Fucking Manual'.  1.
      Used  by  gurus  to brush off questions they consider trivial or
      annoying.  Compare Don't do that, then!  2. Used when  reporting
      a  problem  to  indicate  that  you  aren't  just  asking out of
      randomness.  "No, I can't figure out how to interface UNIX to my
      toaster,  and  yes,  I  have RTFM."  Unlike sense 1, this use is
      considered polite. ...
         --- "The on-line hacker Jargon File, version 3.0, 29 July
          1993",      available via anon. ftp to ftp.gnu.ai.mit.edu as
                         "/pub/gnu/jarg300.txt.gz"

PREFACE
     This posting is intended to  help,  provide  basic  information,  and
     serve  as  a  "first straw" for INDIVIDUALs, i.e.  uninitiated hitch-
     hikers, who are stranded in the mindboggling universe of Evolutionary
     Computation  (EC);  that  in turn is only a small footpath to an even
     more mindboggling  scientific  universe,  that,  incorporating  Fuzzy
     Systems,  and Artificial Neural Networks, is sometimes referred to as
     Computational Intelligence (CI); that in turn is only part of an even
     more  advanced scientific universe of mindparalysing complexity, that
     incorporating Artificial Life, Fractal Geometry,  and  other  Complex
     Systems  Sciences might someday be referred to as Natural Computation
     (NC).

     Over the course of the past  years,  GLOBAL  OPTIMIZATION  algorithms
     imitating  certain  principles of nature have proved their usefulness
     in various domains of  applications.  Especially  worth  copying  are
     those  principles  where  nature  has  found  "stable  islands"  in a
     "turbulent ocean" of solution possibilities. Such  phenomena  can  be
     found  in annealing processes, central nervous systems and biological
     EVOLUTION, which in turn have  lead  to  the  following  OPTIMIZATION
     methods:  Simulated Annealing (SA), Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs)
     and the field of Evolutionary Computation (EC).

     EC may currently be characterized by the following pathways:  Genetic
     Algorithms  (GA), Evolutionary Programming (EP), Evolution Strategies
     (ES), Classifier Systems (CFS), Genetic Programming (GP), and several
     other  problem  solving  strategies,  that  are based upon biological
     observations, that date back to Charles Darwin's discoveries  in  the
     19th  century: the means of natural selection and the survival of the
     fittest, i.e. the "theory of evolution." The inspired algorithms  are
     thus termed Evolutionary Algorithms (EA).

     Moreover,  this  posting  is  intended  to  help  those  who are just
     beginning to read this newsgroup, and those who are new "on"  USENET.
     It  shall help to avoid lengthy discussions of questions that usually
     arise for beginners of one or the other kind, and which are boring to
     read again and again by comp.ai.genetic "old-timers."

     You  will  see  this  posting  popping  up periodically in the USENET
     newsgroup comp.ai.genetic (and also comp.answers,  and  news.answers,
     where it should be locatable at any time).


CONTRIBUTIONS
     Contributions, additions, corrections, cash, etc. are always welcome.
     Send e-mail to the address above.


DISCLAIMER
     This periodic posting is not meant to discuss any topic exhaustively,
     but  should  be  thought of as a list of reference pointers, instead.
     This posting is provided on an "as is" basis, NO WARRANTY  whatsoever
     is expressed or implied, especially, NO WARRANTY that the information
     contained herein  is  up-to-date,  correct  or  useful  in  any  way,
     although all this is intended.
     Moreover,  please  note  that  the  opinions  expressed herein do not
     necessarily reflect those of the editors' institutions or  employers,
     neither  as  a  whole, nor in part. They are just the amalgamation of
     the editors' collections of ideas,  and  contributions  gleaned  from
     other sources.

     NOTE:  some  portions of this otherwise rather dry guide are intended
     to be satirical.  If you do not recognize it as  such,  consult  your
     local doctor or a professional comedian.


HITCH-HIKING THE FAQNIVERSE
     This  guide  is  big.  Really big. You just won't believe how hugely,
     vastly, mindbogglingly big it is. That's why it has been split into a
     "trilogy" -- which, like all successful trilogies, eventually ends up
     consisting of more than three parts.


 Searching for answers
     To find the answer of question number x, just search for  the  string
     "Qx:". (So the answer to question 42 is at "Q42:"!)

 What does, e.g. [ICGA85] mean?
     Some  books are referenced again and again, that's why they have this
     kind of "tag", that an experienced hitch-hiker will search for in the
     list of books (see Q10: and Q12:) to dissolve the riddle.

 Why all this UPPERCASING in running text?
     Words  written  in  all  uppercase  letters  are  cross-references to
     entries in the Glossary  (see  Q99).  Here,  they  have  a  ":"  sign
     appended,  thus  if  you  find, say EVOLUTION, you can search for the
     string "EVOLUTION:" in the Glossary.

 FTP and HTTP naming conventions
     A file available on an FTP server will be  specified  as:  <ftp-site-
     name>:<the-complete-filename>  So for example, the file bar.tar.gz in
     the directory /pub/foo on the ftp server  ftp.certain.site  would  be
     specified as: ftp.certain.site:/pub/foo/bar.tar.gz

     A  specification  ending  with  a  "/"  is  a  reference  to  a whole
     directory, e.g.  ftp.certain.site:/pub/foo/

     HTML files are specified in a  similar  way,  but  with  the  prefix:
     http://

 Referencing this Guide
     If  you  want  to  reference this guide (although I have currently no
     idea, why you should want to do this), we'd be insanely proud  if  it
     looks like:

     Heitkoetter,  Joerg  and  Beasley,  David,  eds.   (1994) "The Hitch-
     Hiker's Guide to EVOLUTIONARY COMPUTATION: A list of Frequently Asked
     Questions  (FAQ)",  USENET: comp.ai.genetic.  Available via anonymous
     FTP from rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/news.answers/ai-faq/genetic/  About
     90 pages.

     Or simply call it "the Guide", or "HHGTEC" for acronymaniacs.

 Obtaining copies of this guide
     This      FAQ      is      available      between     postings     on
     rtfm.mit.edu:/pub/usenet/news.answers/ai-faq/genetic/ as  the  files:
     part?.   The  FAQ  may  also  be  retrieved  by  e-mail  from  <mail-
     [e-mail]>. Send a message to the mail-server  with  "help"
     and "index" in the body on separate lines for more information.

     A  PostScript  version  is  also  available.  This looks really crisp
     (using boldface, italics, etc.),  and  is  available  for  those  who
     prefer  offline  reading.   Get  the  file  from  the SyS ftp-server:
     lumpi.informatik.uni-dortmund.de:/pub/EA/docs/hhgtec-*.ps.gz
     (129.217.36.140);   or   from   within   the   US   you   might  try:
     alife.santafe.edu:/pub/USER-AREA/EC/FAQ/hhgtec-*.ps.gz

        "As a net is made up of a series of ties, so everything in
        this world is connected by a series of ties.  If anyone thinks
       that the mesh of a net is an independent, isolated thing, he is
       mistaken.  It is called a net because it is made up of a series
         of interconnected meshes, and each mesh has its place and
                  responsibility in relation to other meshes."

                                --- Buddha

 The ZEN Puzzle
     For some weird reason this guide contains some puzzles which can only
     be  solved  by  cautious  readers  who have (1) a certain amount of a
     certain kind of humor, (2) a certain amount of patience and time, (3)
     a  certain  amount of experience in ZEN NAVIGATION, and (4) a certain
     amount of books of a certain author.

     Usually, puzzles search either for certain answers (more  often,  ONE
     answer)  to  a  question;  or,  for the real smartasses, sometimes an
     answer is presented, and a certain question  is  searched  for.   ZEN
     puzzles are even more challenging: you have to come up with an answer
     to a question, both of which are not  explicitly,  rather  implicitly
     stated  somewhere  in  this  FAQ.   Thus, you are expected to give an
     answer AND a question!

     To give an impression what this is all about, consider the following,
     submitted  by  Craig  W.  Reynolds.  The correct question is: "Why is
     Fisher's `improbability quote' (cf EPILOGUE) included in this  FAQ?",
     Craig's correct answer is: `This is a GREAT quotation, it sounds like
     something directly out of  a  turn  of  the  century  Douglas  Adams:
     Natural  SELECTION:  the original "Infinite Improbability Drive"' Got
     the message? Well, this was easy and very obvious. The other  puzzles
     are more challenging...

     However,  all  this is just for fun (mine and hopefully yours), there
     is nothing like the $100 price, some big shots in  computer  science,
     e.g.   Don  Knuth  usually  offer;  all  there  is  but  a  honorable
     mentioning of the ZEN navigator, including the  puzzle  s/he  solved.
     It's  thus  like  in  real life: don't expect to make money from your
     time being a scientist, it's all just for the fun of it...

     Enjoy the trip!







TABLE OF CONTENTS
 ai-faq/genetic/part1

     Q0: How about an introduction to all this?
     Q0.1: What is comp.ai.genetic all about?
     Q0.2: How do I get started? What about USENET documentation?
     Q0.3: Where can I get further information about the internet?

 ai-faq/genetic/part2

     Q1: What are Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs)?
     Q1.1: What's a Genetic Algorithm (GA)?
     Q1.2: What's Evolutionary Programming (EP)?
     Q1.3: What's an Evolution Strategy (ES)?
     Q1.4: What's a Classifier System (CFS)?
     Q1.5: What's Genetic Programming (GP)?

 ai-faq/genetic/part3


     Q2: What applications of EAs are there?

     Q3: Who is concerned with EAs?

     Q4: How many EAs exist? Which?
     Q4.1: What about Alife systems, like Tierra and VENUS?

     Q5: What about all this Optimization stuff?

 ai-faq/genetic/part4

     Q10: What introductory material on EAs is there?
     Q10.1: Suitable background reading for beginners?
     Q10.2: Textbooks on EC?
     Q10.3: The Classics?
     Q10.4: Introductory Journal Articles?
     Q10.5: Introductory Technical Reports?
     Q10.6: Not-quite-so-introductory Literature?
     Q10.7: Biological Background Readings?
     Q10.8: On-line bibliography collections?
     Q10.9: Videos?
     Q10.10: CD-ROMs?
     Q10.11: How do I get a copy of a dissertation?

     Q11: What EC related journals and magazines are there?

     Q12: What are the important conferences/proceedings on EC?

     Q13: What Evolutionary Computation Associations exist?

     Q14: What Technical Reports are available?

     Q15: What other sources of information are there?
     Q15.1: What Electronic Digests are there?
     Q15.2: What Electronic Mailing Lists are there?
     Q15.3: Which Research Institutes can be accessed over the net?
     Q15.4: What relevant newsgroups and FAQs are there?
     Q15.5: What about all these Internet Services?

 ai-faq/genetic/part5

     Q20: What EA software packages are available?
     Q20.1: Free software packages?
     Q20.2: Commercial software packages?
     Q20.3: Current research projects?

 ai-faq/genetic/part6

     Q21: What are Gray codes, and why are they used?

     Q22: What test data is available?

     Q42: What is Life all about?
     Q42b: Is there a FAQ to this group?

     Q98: Are there any patents on EAs?

     Q99: A Glossary on EAs?

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Subject: Q0: How about an introduction to all this?

     Certainly. See Q0.1, Q0.2 and Q0.3 below.

------------------------------

Subject: Q0.1: What is comp.ai.genetic all about?

     The newsgroup comp.ai.genetic is intended as a forum for  people  who
     want  to  use or explore the capabilities of Genetic Algorithms (GA),
     Evolutionary Programming (EP), Evolution Strategies (ES),  Classifier
     Systems  (CFS),  Genetic Programming (GP), and some other, less well-
     known problem solving  algorithms  that  are  more  or  less  loosely
     coupled to the field of Evolutionary Computation (EC).

------------------------------

Subject: Q0.2: How do I get started? What about USENET documentation?

     The  following guidelines present the essentials of the USENET online
     documentation, that is posted each month to news.announce.newusers.

     If you are already familiar with "netiquette" you can skip to the end
     of  this  answer;  if you don't know what the hell this is all about,
     proceed as follows: (1) carefully read the following paragraphs,  (2)
     read  all  the documents in news.announce.newusers before posting any
     article to USENET.  At least you should give the introductory stuff a
     try,  i.e.  files "news-answers/introduction" and "news-answers/news-
     newusers-intro". Both are survey articles, that provide a  short  and
     easy  way  to  get an overview of the interesting parts of the online
     docs, and thus can help to prevent you from drowning in the megabytes
     to  read. Both can be received either by subscribing to news.answers,
     or sending the following message to <[e-mail]>:

      send usenet/news.answers/introduction
      send usenet/news.answers/news-newusers-intro
      quit

                  Netiquette

         "Usenet is a convention, in every sense of the word."

     Although USENET is usually characterized as "an anarchy, with no laws
     and  no  one  in  charge" there have "emerged" several rules over the
     past years that shall facilitate life within  newsgroups.  Thus,  you
     will probably find the following types of articles:

 1. Requests
     Requests  are  articles  of  the form "I am looking for X" where X is
     something public like a book, an article, a piece of software.

     If multiple different answers can be expected, the person making  the
     request  should  prepare  to make a summary of the answers he/she got
     and announce to do  so  with  a  phrase  like  "Please  e-mail,  I'll
     summarize" at the end of the posting.

     The  Subject  line  of  the  posting  should  then  be something like
     "Request: X"

 2. Questions
     As opposed to requests, questions are  concerned  with  something  so
     specific  that  general  interest  cannot readily be assumed.  If the
     poster thinks that the topic is  of  some  general  interest,  he/she
     should announce a summary (see above).

     The  Subject  line of the posting should be something like "Question:
     this-and-that" (Q: this-and-that) or have  the  form  of  a  question
     (i.e., end with a question mark)


 3. Answers
     These  are  reactions  to  questions or requests.  As a rule of thumb
     articles of type "answer" should be rare.   Ideally,  in  most  cases
     either  the  answer  is  too  specific to be of general interest (and
     should thus be e-mailed to the poster) or  a  summary  was  announced
     with  the question or request (and answers should thus be e-mailed to
     the poster).

     The subject lines of answers are automatically adjusted by  the  news
     software.

 4. Summaries
     In  all  cases  of requests or questions the answers for which can be
     assumed to be of some general interest, the poster of the request  or
     question shall summarize the answers he/she received.  Such a summary
     should be announced in  the  original  posting  of  the  question  or
     request with a phrase like "Please answer by e-mail, I'll summarize"

     In  such  a  case  answers  should NOT be posted to the newsgroup but
     instead be mailed to the poster who collects and reviews them.  After
     about 10 to 20 days from the original posting, its poster should make
     the summary of answers and post it to the net.

     Some care should be invested into a summary:

     a) simple concatenation of all  the  answers  might  not  be  enough;
    instead  redundancies, irrelevances, verbosities and errors should
    be filtered out (as good as possible),

     b) the answers shall be separated clearly

     c) the contributors of the INDIVIDUAL answers shall  be  identifiable
    unless  they  requested  to  remain anonymous [eds note: yes, that
    happens])

     d) the summary shall start with the "quintessence" of the answers, as
    seen by the original poster

     e) A  summary  should, when posted, clearly be indicated to be one by
    giving it a Subject line starting with "Summary:"

    Note that a good  summary  is  pure  gold  for  the  rest  of  the
    newsgroup  community,  so summary work will be most appreciated by
    all of us.  (Good summaries are more valuable than

 5. Announcements
     Some articles never need  any  public  reaction.   These  are  called
     announcements  (for  instance  for  a  workshop,  conference  or  the
     availability of some technical report or software system).

     Announcements should be clearly indicated to be such by giving them a
     subject  line  of the form "Announcement: this-and-that", or "ust "A:
     this-and-that".

     Due to common practice,  conference  announcements  usually  carry  a
     "CFP:"  in  their subject line, i.e. "call for papers" (or: "call for
     participation").


 6. Reports
     Sometimes people  spontaneously  want  to  report  something  to  the
     newsgroup.  This  might  be  special  experiences with some software,
     results  of  own  experiments  or  conceptual  work,  or   especially
     interesting information from somewhere else.

     Reports  should  be  clearly  indicated  to  be such by giving them a
     subject line of the form "Report: this-and-that"

 7. Discussions
     An especially valuable possibility of USENET is  of  course  that  of
     discussing  a  certain topic with hundreds of potential participants.
     All traffic in the newsgroup that can not be subsumed  under  one  of
     the above categories should belong to a discussion.

     If  somebody explicitly wants to start a discussion, he/she can do so
     by giving the posting a subject line of the form  "Start  discussion:
     this-and-that"  (People  who  react on this, please remove the "Start
     discussion: " label from the subject line of your replies)

     It is quite difficult to keep a discussion from drifting into  chaos,
     but,  unfortunately,  as many other newsgroups show there seems to be
     no secure way to avoid this.  On the other hand, comp.ai.genetic  has
     not  had  many  problems  with this effect, yet, so let's just go and
     hope...

     Thanks in advance for your patience!

------------------------------

Subject: Q0.3: Where can I get further information about the internet?

     In 1993 the EFF (Electronic Frontier  Foundation)  announced  a  user
     guide for novices on all the Internet has to offer, called:

             The Big Dummy's Guide to the Internet

     The  Guide  is  posted  to  "the  'net"  in ASCII and Hypercard (Mac)
     formats (see  comp.org.eff.news).   It  can  also  be  downloaded  by
     anonymous  FTP  from  ftp.eff.org:/pub/Net_info/Big_Dummy/  The ASCII
     version is in file big-dummys-guide.txt .  The Hypercard stack is  in
     file  big-dummys-guide.sea.hqx  .   The Texinfo versions (PostScript,
     TeX  DVI,  HTML,  GNU  Info,  ASCII)   are   in   the   sub-directory
     Other_versions/  .   The  hypertext  (HTML) version can be browsed by
     using a WWW reader, such as  mosaic,  and  opening  a  URL  with  the
     address: http://www.germany.eu.net:/books/bdgtti/bdgtti-intro.html

     More information on internet services is given in Q15.5.

------------------------------

End of ai-faq/genetic/part1
***************************