The Multi-Mode Resource-Constrained Multi-Project Scheduling Problem

Scheduling projects is a difficult and time consuming process, and has far-reaching implications for any organization’s operations. By generalizing various aspects of project scheduling, decision makers are enabled to capture reality and act accordingly. In the context of the MISTA 2013 conference, the first MISTA challenge, organized by the authors, introduced such a general problem model: the Multi-Mode Resource-Constrained Multi-Project Scheduling Problem (MRCMPSP). The present paper reports on the competition and provides a discussion on its results. Furthermore, it provides an analysis of the submitted algorithms, and a study of their common elements. By making all benchmark datasets and results publicly available, further research on the MRCMPSP is stimulated.

[1]  Federico Barber,et al.  An efficient hybrid genetic algorithm for scheduling projects with resource constraints and multiple execution modes , 2009 .

[2]  T. Stützle,et al.  Automatic Design of a Hybrid Iterated Local Search for the Multi-Mode Resource-Constrained Multi-Project Scheduling Problem , 2013 .

[3]  Sanja Petrovic,et al.  The Cross-Domain Heuristic Search Challenge - An International Research Competition , 2011, LION.

[4]  Francisco Ballestín,et al.  Justification and RCPSP: A technique that pays , 2005, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[5]  Barry McCollum,et al.  The Third International Timetabling Competition , 2012, Ann. Oper. Res..

[6]  Martin Josef Geiger Iterated Variable Neighborhood Search for the resource constrained multi-mode multi-project scheduling problem , 2013, ArXiv.

[7]  Patrick De Causmaecker,et al.  Real-world production scheduling for the food industry: An integrated approach , 2012, Eng. Appl. Artif. Intell..

[8]  Patrick De Causmaecker,et al.  The first international nurse rostering competition 2010 , 2010, Ann. Oper. Res..

[9]  Jan Karel Lenstra,et al.  Scheduling subject to resource constraints: classification and complexity , 1983, Discret. Appl. Math..

[10]  RAINER KOLISCH,et al.  Local search for nonpreemptive multi-mode resource-constrained project scheduling , 1997 .

[11]  Greet Van den Berghe,et al.  An Integer Programming Approach to a Generalized Project Scheduling Problem , 2014 .

[12]  Ender Özcan,et al.  Combining Monte-Carlo and hyper-heuristic methods for the multi-mode resource-constrained multi-project scheduling problem , 2015, Inf. Sci..

[13]  Christine Solnon,et al.  The car sequencing problem: Overview of state-of-the-art methods and industrial case-study of the ROADEF'2005 challenge problem , 2008, Eur. J. Oper. Res..