Alternatives to Evolutionary Optimization Algorithms in the Context of Traditional Stochastic Optimization Methods in Smart Area Technical Equipment Applications

The use of evolutionary computational techniques has become widespread in many technical disciplines including, but not limited, neural networks and evolutionary algorithms. From these techniques, in the field of global optimization, mainly the evolutionary optimization algorithms are used, especially one of their types – genetic algorithms. From the mathematical point of view, the evolutionary and genetic algorithms are just another representatives of stochastic optimization algorithms. The aim of our research was to describe the basic properties of stochastic algorithms including genetic algorithms, to select suitable candidates from the class of traditional stochastic algorithms and to compare their behaviour with the genetic algorithms. In this paper, we are going to address so-called technical optimization, where we do not know the optimized function directly, but we are able to get the value of an optimized function at any point (for example by measuring a certain quantity). The stochastic optimization algorithms provide the advantage of efficient working even with such functions. An important criterion for optimization is also the ability to parallelize a task. The optimization algorithms can be implemented as a parallel system – we calculate the value of a purpose function at several points at the same time. The paper will also describe the specific described implementation and testing of selected algorithms on analytical functions as well as functions mediated by artificial neural networks, which have been learned on practice data. Furthermore, the algorithm implementation for different environments and their routine user-friendly practical applications are described. The aim of our research was also to select those representatives of traditional stochastic algorithms that would be able to compete with the genetic algorithms by their accuracy or speed, to implement these algorithms and to test them on specific data. Last but not least, the results of testing of each algorithm on the practice data will be presented and, in the final phase, these results will be analysed.