Weighting Attributes Based on the Greedy Algorithm Properties

Estimation of importance for considered features is an important issue for any knowledge exploration process and it can be executed by a variety of approaches. In the research reported in this study, the primary aim was the development of a methodology for creating attribute rankings. Based on the properties of the greedy algorithm for inducing decision rules, a new application of this algorithm has been proposed. Instead of constructing a single ordering of features, attributes were weighted multiple times. The input datasets were discretised with several algorithms representing supervised and unsupervised discretisation approaches. Each resulting discrete data variant was exploited to construct a ranking of attributes. The effectiveness of the obtained rankings was confirmed through a rule filtering process governed by weighted attributes. The methodology was applied to the stylometric task of authorship attribution. The experimental outcomes demonstrate the value of the proposed research method, as it generally led to improved predictions while taking into account a noticeably decreased sets of attributes and decision rules.