Scheduling : Theory, Algorithms, and Systems

Efficient scheduling of resources is critical to the proper functioning of businesses in today's competitive environment. Scheduling focuses on theoretical as well as applied aspects of the scheduling of resources. It is unique in the range of problems and issues that it covers. The book consists of three parts. The first part focuses on deterministic scheduling and deals with the combinational problems that arise in deterministic scheduling. The second part covers probabilistic scheduling models. In this part it is assumed that processing times and other problem data are not known in advance with certainty. The third part deals with scheduling in practice. It covers heuristics that are popular with practitioners and also delves into system design and developmental issues. INCLUDES: *Discussion of the basic properties of scheduling models. *Computational as well as theoretical exercises at the end of each chapter. *Thorough examination of numerous applications. *Investigation of the latest developments in the field. *Discussion of future research developments. A software package especially designed for the readers of this text is available free of charge on the web.Known as LEKIN, this system covers most of the machine environments discussed in this book and enables the user to test many of the algorithms and heuristics described. This book is of interest to theoreticians and practitioners alike. Graduate students in operations research, industrial engineering, and computer science will find the book to be an accessible and invaluable resource. Scheduling will serve as an essential reference for professionals working on scheduling problems in manufacturing and computing environments.