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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher-id">JDS</journal-id>
<journal-title-group><journal-title>Journal of Data Science</journal-title></journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub">1683-8602</issn><issn pub-type="ppub">1680-743X</issn><issn-l>1680-743X</issn-l>
<publisher>
<publisher-name>School of Statistics, Renmin University of China</publisher-name>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">JDS1162</article-id>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.6339/24-JDS1162</article-id>
<article-categories><subj-group subj-group-type="heading">
<subject>Computing in Data Science</subject></subj-group></article-categories>
<title-group>
<article-title>ReLU-ReHU Representations of Piecewise Linear-Quadratic Losses</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group>
<contrib contrib-type="author">
<name><surname>Gao</surname><given-names>Tingxian</given-names></name><xref ref-type="aff" rid="j_jds1162_aff_001">1</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author">
<name><surname>Dai</surname><given-names>Ben</given-names></name><email xlink:href="mailto:bendai@cuhk.edu.hk">bendai@cuhk.edu.hk</email><xref ref-type="aff" rid="j_jds1162_aff_001">1</xref><xref ref-type="corresp" rid="cor1">∗</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author">
<name><surname>Qiu</surname><given-names>Yixuan</given-names></name><xref ref-type="aff" rid="j_jds1162_aff_002">2</xref>
</contrib>
<aff id="j_jds1162_aff_001"><label>1</label>Department of Statistics, <institution>The Chinese University of Hong Kong</institution>, <country>China</country></aff>
<aff id="j_jds1162_aff_002"><label>2</label>School of Statistics and Management, <institution>Shanghai University of Finance and Economics</institution>, <country>China</country></aff>
</contrib-group>
<author-notes>
<corresp id="cor1"><label>∗</label>Corresponding author. Email: <ext-link ext-link-type="uri" xlink:href="mailto:bendai@cuhk.edu.hk">bendai@cuhk.edu.hk</ext-link>.</corresp>
</author-notes>
<pub-date pub-type="ppub"><year>2025</year></pub-date><pub-date pub-type="epub"><day>20</day><month>1</month><year>2025</year></pub-date><volume>23</volume><issue>4</issue><fpage>648</fpage><lpage>658</lpage><supplementary-material id="S1" content-type="archive" xlink:href="jds1162_s001.zip" mimetype="application" mime-subtype="x-zip-compressed">
<caption>
<title>Supplementary Material</title>
<p>The data, code, and README are all available at <uri>https://github.com/keepwith/PLQComposite</uri>.</p>
</caption>
</supplementary-material><history><date date-type="received"><day>27</day><month>9</month><year>2024</year></date><date date-type="accepted"><day>25</day><month>12</month><year>2024</year></date></history>
<permissions><copyright-statement>2025 The Author(s). Published by the School of Statistics and the Center for Applied Statistics, Renmin University of China.</copyright-statement><copyright-year>2025</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access" xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">
<license-p>Open access article under the <ext-link ext-link-type="uri" xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</ext-link> license.</license-p></license></permissions>
<abstract>
<p>Piecewise linear-quadratic (PLQ) functions are a fundamental function class in convex optimization, especially within the Empirical Risk Minimization (ERM) framework, which employs various PLQ loss functions. This paper provides a workflow for decomposing a general convex PLQ loss into its ReLU-ReHU representation, along with a Python implementation designed to enhance the efficiency of presenting and solving ERM problems, particularly when integrated with <sc>ReHLine</sc> (a powerful solver for PLQ ERMs). Our proposed package, <monospace>plqcom</monospace>, accepts three representations of PLQ functions and offers user-friendly APIs for verifying their convexity and continuity. The Python package is available at <uri>https://github.com/keepwith/PLQComposite</uri>.</p>
</abstract>
<kwd-group>
<label>Keywords</label>
<kwd>empirical risk minimization</kwd>
<kwd>optimization</kwd>
<kwd>piecewise linear-quadratic function</kwd>
<kwd>Python package</kwd>
<kwd>ReHLine</kwd>
</kwd-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
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