Related papers: On Convergence of some Gradient-based Temporal-Dif…

Off-policy algorithms, in which a behavior policy differs from the target policy and is used to gain experience for learning, have proven to be of great practical value in reinforcement learning. However, even for simple convex problems…

Gradient-based temporal difference (GTD) algorithms are widely used in off-policy learning scenarios. Among them, the two time-scale TD with gradient correction (TDC) algorithm has been shown to have superior performance. In contrast to…

In this paper, we analyze the convergence rate of the gradient temporal difference learning (GTD) family of algorithms. Previous analyses of this class of algorithms use ODE techniques to prove asymptotic convergence, and to the best of our…

Off-policy learning ability is an important feature of reinforcement learning (RL) for practical applications. However, even one of the most elementary RL algorithms, temporal-difference (TD) learning, is known to suffer form divergence…

We consider the emphatic temporal-difference (TD) algorithm, ETD($\lambda$), for learning the value functions of stationary policies in a discounted, finite state and action Markov decision process. The ETD($\lambda$) algorithm was recently…

We consider off-policy temporal-difference (TD) learning in discounted Markov decision processes, where the goal is to evaluate a policy in a model-free way by using observations of a state process generated without executing the policy. To…

Learning the value function of a given policy (target policy) from the data samples obtained from a different policy (behavior policy) is an important problem in Reinforcement Learning (RL). This problem is studied under the setting of…

Temporal difference learning (TD) is a simple iterative algorithm used to estimate the value function corresponding to a given policy in a Markov decision process. Although TD is one of the most widely used algorithms in reinforcement…

In this paper, we introduce proximal gradient temporal difference learning, which provides a principled way of designing and analyzing true stochastic gradient temporal difference learning algorithms. We show how gradient TD (GTD)…

Temporal difference learning and Residual Gradient methods are the most widely used temporal difference based learning algorithms; however, it has been shown that none of their objective functions is optimal w.r.t approximating the true…

This paper analyzes multi-step temporal difference (TD)-learning algorithms within the ``deadly triad'' scenario, characterized by linear function approximation, off-policy learning, and bootstrapping. In particular, we prove that $n$-step…

Value functions derived from Markov decision processes arise as a central component of algorithms as well as performance metrics in many statistics and engineering applications of machine learning techniques. Computation of the solution to…

Gradient Temporal Difference (GTD) algorithms (Sutton et al., 2008, 2009) are the first $O(d)$ ($d$ is the number features) algorithms that have convergence guarantees for off-policy learning with linear function approximation. Liu et al.…

Temporal difference (TD) learning is a foundational algorithm in reinforcement learning (RL). For nearly forty years, TD learning has served as a workhorse for applied RL as well as a building block for more complex and specialized…

In this paper we introduce the idea of improving the performance of parametric temporal-difference (TD) learning algorithms by selectively emphasizing or de-emphasizing their updates on different time steps. In particular, we show that…

We consider emphatic temporal-difference learning algorithms for policy evaluation in discounted Markov decision processes with finite spaces. Such algorithms were recently proposed by Sutton, Mahmood, and White (2015) as an improved…

Temporal difference learning with linear function approximation is a popular method to obtain a low-dimensional approximation of the value function of a policy in a Markov Decision Process. We give a new interpretation of this method in…

Off-policy learning refers to the problem of learning the value function of a way of behaving, or policy, while following a different policy. Gradient-based off-policy learning algorithms, such as GTD and TDC/GQ, converge even when using…

This paper addresses the issue of policy evaluation in Markov Decision Processes, using linear function approximation. It provides a unified view of algorithms such as TD(lambda), LSTD(lambda), iLSTD, residual-gradient TD. It is asserted…

We devise a distributional variant of gradient temporal-difference (TD) learning. Distributional reinforcement learning has been demonstrated to outperform the regular one in the recent study \citep{bellemare2017distributional}. In the…