A fast implementation of the CT-EXT algorithm for the testor property identification

Abstract

Typical testors are a useful tool for both feature selection and for determining feature relevance in supervised classification problems. Nowadays, generating all typical testors of a training matrix is computationally expensive; all reported algorithms have exponential complexity, depending mainly on the number of columns in the training matrix. For this reason, different approaches such as sequential and parallel algorithms, genetic algorithms and hardware implementations techniques have been developed. In this paper, we introduce a fast implementation of the algorithm CT-EXT (which is one of the fastest algorithms reported) based on an accumulative binary tuple, developed for generating all typical testors of a training matrix. The accumulative binary tuple implemented in the CT-EXT algorithm, is a useful way to simplifies the search of feature combinations which fulfill the testor property, because its implementation decreases the number of operations involved in the process of generating all typical testors. In addition, experimental results using the proposed fast implementation of the CT-EXT algorithm and the comparison with other state of the art algorithms that generated typical testors are presented. © 2010 Springer-Verlag.