Sarsa

SARSA stands for State-Action-Reward-State-Action

SARSA is another value-based Reinforcement learning algorithm, differing from Q-learning in that it updates the Q-values based on the action actually taken by the policy.

SARSA update rule:

$$Q(s_t,a_t)\leftarrow Q(s_t,a_t)+\alpha \left[r_{t+1}+\gamma Q(s_{t+1},a_{t+1})-Q(s_t,a_t)\right]$$

Explanation:

• $Q(s_t,a_t)$: The Q-value of the current state $s_t$ and action $a_t$.
• $\alpha$: The learning rate, determining how much new information overrides old information.
• $r_{t+1}$: The reward received after taking action $a_t$ from state $s_t$.
• $\gamma$: The discount factor, balancing immediate and future rewards.
• $Q(s_{t+1},a_{t+1})$: The Q-value for the next state $s_{t+1}$ and the action $a_{t+1}$ actually taken according to the policy.

Notes:

• SARSA’s on-policy nature ensures that it learns a policy that aligns with its exploration strategy, leading to more stable behavior in environments with randomness or noise.
• The learning process may be slower compared to Q-learning, but it can be more robust in environments where the agent’s behavior is expected to align closely with the policy it follows.