Prediction by Random-Walk Perturbation

Abstract

We propose a version of the follow-the-perturbed-leader online prediction algorithm in which the cumulative losses are perturbed by independent symmetric random walks. The forecaster is shown to achieve an expected regret of the optimal order O( p n logN) where n is the time horizon and N is the number of experts. More importantly, it is shown that the forecaster changes its prediction at most O( p n logN) times, in expectation. We also extend the analysis to online combinatorial optimization and show that even in this more general setting, the forecaster rarely switches between experts while having a regret of near-optimal order.

Cite

Text

Devroye et al. "Prediction by Random-Walk Perturbation." Annual Conference on Computational Learning Theory, 2013.

Markdown

[Devroye et al. "Prediction by Random-Walk Perturbation." Annual Conference on Computational Learning Theory, 2013.](https://mlanthology.org/colt/2013/devroye2013colt-prediction/)

BibTeX

@inproceedings{devroye2013colt-prediction,
  title     = {{Prediction by Random-Walk Perturbation}},
  author    = {Devroye, Luc and Lugosi, Gábor and Neu, Gergely},
  booktitle = {Annual Conference on Computational Learning Theory},
  year      = {2013},
  pages     = {460-473},
  url       = {https://mlanthology.org/colt/2013/devroye2013colt-prediction/}
}