On the Online Generation of Effective Macro-operators

Macro-operator (“macro”, for short) generation is a
well-known technique that is used to speed-up the
planning process. Most published work on using
macros in automated planning relies on an offline
learning phase where training plans, that is, solutions
of simple problems, are used to generate the
macros. However, there might not always be a place
to accommodate training.
In this paper we propose OMA, an efficient method
for generating useful macros without an offline
learning phase, by utilising lessons learnt from existing
macro learning techniques. Empirical evaluation
with IPC benchmarks demonstrates performance
improvement in a range of state-of-the-art
planning engines, and provides insights into what
macros can be generated without training.