English

Decentralized Projection-free Online Upper-Linearizable Optimization with Applications to DR-Submodular Optimization

Optimization and Control 2026-02-25 v2 Computational Complexity Machine Learning Machine Learning

Abstract

We introduce a novel framework for decentralized projection-free optimization, extending projection-free methods to a broader class of upper-linearizable functions. Our approach leverages decentralized optimization techniques with the flexibility of upper-linearizable function frameworks, effectively generalizing traditional DR-submodular function optimization. We obtain the regret of O(T1θ/2)O(T^{1-\theta/2}) with communication complexity of O(Tθ)O(T^{\theta}) and number of linear optimization oracle calls of O(T2θ)O(T^{2\theta}) for decentralized upper-linearizable function optimization, for any 0θ10\le \theta \le 1. This approach allows for the first results for monotone up-concave optimization with general convex constraints and non-monotone up-concave optimization with general convex constraints. Further, the above results for first order feedback are extended to zeroth order, semi-bandit, and bandit feedback.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2501.18183,
  title  = {Decentralized Projection-free Online Upper-Linearizable Optimization with Applications to DR-Submodular Optimization},
  author = {Yiyang Lu and Mohammad Pedramfar and Vaneet Aggarwal},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2501.18183},
  year   = {2026}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-28T21:25:10.101Z