Introducing the LP problem

Let’s pause for a minute and understand what exactly LP is and how we can formulate this kind of problem using machine learning (ML) vocabulary.

LP examples

In order to understand what LP is, let’s see some real-life scenarios where these problems can be and are used:

• Social networks: In a social network containing people who have certain relationships with each other, we can try and predict who the next people to meet or collaborate on a project will be. We can think of the following types of relationships, but there are many more:
  • Social media (know, follow)
  • Communication network (phone call)
  • Research paper authors: co-authorship of a research paper (research collaboration)
• Criminal networks: A criminal network, by nature, is not fully known to the people analyzing it (police authorities). The LP technique helps in identifying unknown links between people and better predicting criminal behavior.
• Entity resolution: Sometimes...