arXiv:2608.02612cs.CLcs.LG2026-08

用大模型自动解决黑箱优化问题,首次构建评估基准。

BBOWP-Bench: Evaluating LLMs on Black-Box Optimization Word Problems

论文配图:BBOWP-Bench: Evaluating LLMs on Black-Box Optimization Word Problems
图 1 · 摘自论文原文
  • 从自然语言描述中推断搜索空间与优化算法
  • 大模型能根据预算选对算法,但设计搜索空间仍有困难
  • 适合研究自动化优化与大模型推理的学者

优化问题的表述显著影响最终解的质量,但良好表述通常需专业知识。近年来研究尝试从自然语言自动推导优化问题,但现有基准多限于目标与约束可显式表达的情形。许多实际重要问题属于黑箱优化(BBO),仅可观测目标值,函数形式未知。在BBO中,搜索空间设计与优化算法选择至关重要。用大语言模型(LLMs)自动化这一过程面临挑战。本文提出黑箱优化文字问题(BBOWP)新范式,要求系统从自然语言描述中推断搜索空间与优化算法。为此构建了BBOWP基准套件(BBOWP-Bench),包含自然语言问题描述、可执行评估环境与人工基线方案,支持对搜索空间设计与算法选择的双重评估。基于该基准,首次评估了大模型性能:当前大模型可根据评估预算选择合适算法,但在信息不足或问题高度特定时,难以准确识别关键变量并合理设定范围。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

Formulating an optimization problem strongly affects the quality of the final solution, yet good formulations usually require substantial expertise. Recent studies have therefore examined how to automatically derive optimization problems from natural-language descriptions, but existing benchmarks focus on settings where objectives and constraints can be written explicitly as mathematical expressions. Many practically important problems are naturally treated as black-box optimization (BBO) problems, in which only objective values are observable, and the functional form is unavailable. In BBO, the search space design, a part of the problem formulation, and the selection of the optimization algorithm are crucial for problem-solving. Automating these processes with large language models (LLMs) is a significant challenge. This paper introduces Black-Box Optimization Word Problems (BBOWP), a novel problem setting in which a system must infer both a search space and an optimization algorithm from a natural-language description of a black-box optimization task. To support research on this setting, we establish the BBOWP Benchmark Suite (BBOWP-Bench), a dataset and evaluation framework for BBOWP. Each instance combines a natural-language problem description, an executable evaluation environment, and a human-designed baseline formulation, allowing evaluation of both search-space design and algorithm selection. Using this benchmark, we provide the first evaluation of LLMs and show that current LLMs are capable of selecting suitable algorithms based on the given evaluation budget. However, they sometimes struggle with search space design, particularly in identifying important variables and balancing their ranges when the problem description is less informative or the search space is highly problem-specific. Our code and dataset are available at https://github.com/shiralab/bbowp-bench.

黑箱优化大模型自动化推理

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