Maintenance Release, New Website, Improved Performance in Mixed Search Spaces

Compatibility

• Require BoTorch 0.13.0

Highlights

• AX website has been upgraded to utilize Docusaurus v3, with the API reference being hosted by ReadTheDocs. The tutorials now expose an option to open with Colab, for easy access to a runtime with modifiable tutorials. The old versions of the website can be found at archive.ax.dev.
• Updated the default transforms and optimizers used in MBM-based models, to offer improved optimization performance in mixed discrete search spaces.
• Implemented a preview version of Ax 1.0 API (ax/preview). The new API is available for use & testing, but remains subject to change until the 1.0 release.
• Introduced new Analysis cards (ax/analysis) for analyzing experiment progress, results and model quality; which will replace various plotting and reporting utilities with a unified API.
• Deprecated a number of legacy models, including GPEI, in favor of the modular BoTorch model (MBM) API.
• Refactored Ax benchmark APIs to simplify problem setup and to support additional use cases such as noisy & asynchronous benchmarking.
• Added EBAshr model, which is used for repeating arms in online experiments as well as regression analysis in the health checks (#3276).
• New advanced capabilities:
  • MBM now supports per-metric model specification and model selection.
  • Support for new transition criteria and input constructors in GenerationNodes.