Incremental itemset mining based on matrix Apriori algorithm

Abstract

Databases are updated continuously with increments and re-running the frequent itemset mining algorithms with every update is inefficient. Studies addressing incremental update problem generally propose incremental itemset mining methods based on Apriori and FP-Growth algorithms. Besides inheriting the disadvantages of base algorithms, incremental itemset mining has challenges such as handling i) increments without re-running the algorithm, ii) support changes, iii) new items and iv) addition/deletions in increments. In this paper, we focus on the solution of incremental update problem by proposing the Incremental Matrix Apriori Algorithm. It scans only new transactions, allows the change of minimum support and handles new items in the increments. The base algorithm Matrix Apriori works without candidate generation, scans database only twice and brings additional advantages. Performance studies show that Incremental Matrix Apriori provides speed-up between 41% and 92% while increment size is varied between 5% and 100%. © 2012 Springer-Verlag.