Provable Submodular Minimization using Wolfe's Algorithm

Owing to several applications in large scale learning and vision problems, fast submodular function minimization (SFM) has become a critical problem. Theoretically, unconstrained SFM can be performed in polynomial time [10, 11]. However, these algorithms are typically not practical. In 1976, Wolfe [21] proposed an algorithm to find the minimum Euclidean norm point in a polytope, and in 1980, Fujishige [3] showed how Wolfe's algorithm can be used for SFM. For general submodular functions, this Fujishige-Wolfe minimum norm algorithm seems to have the best empirical performance.