Modeling and solving university timetabling

This thesis investigates university timetabling problems. These problems occur across universities and are faced each year by the practitioners. We propose new lower bounds, heuristic approaches, mixed integer and constraint programming models to solve them. We address the exam timetabling and the student scheduling problem. We investigate new methods and formulations and compare them to the existing approaches. For exam timetabling, we propose an improvement to an existing mixed integer programming model that makes it possible to obtain optimal solutions. Next, lower bounds, a more compact reformulation for constraints and a constraint programming model are proposed. For the exam timetabling problem at Universite de Technologie de Compiegne, we designed a memetic approach. Finally, we present a new formulation for the student scheduling problem and investigate its performance on a set of real-world instances.

[1]  Andrzej Bargiela,et al.  Adaptive linear combination of heuristic orderings in constructing examination timetables , 2014, Eur. J. Oper. Res..

[2]  Arabinda Tripathy Computerised decision aid for timetabling - a case analysis , 1992, Discret. Appl. Math..

[3]  Graham Kendall,et al.  A graph coloring constructive hyper-heuristic for examination timetabling problems , 2012, Applied Intelligence.

[4]  Jacques Carlier,et al.  Handbook of Scheduling - Algorithms, Models, and Performance Analysis , 2004 .

[5]  A. Parkes,et al.  Properties of Yeditepe Examination Timetabling Benchmark Instances , 2010 .

[6]  Anthony Wren,et al.  Scheduling, Timetabling and Rostering - A Special Relationship? , 1995, PATAT.

[7]  Michael Sampels,et al.  A MAX-MIN Ant System for the University Course Timetabling Problem , 2002, Ant Algorithms.

[8]  Kihong Park,et al.  On the effectiveness of genetic search in combinatorial optimization , 1995, SAC '95.

[9]  F. Glover IMPROVED LINEAR INTEGER PROGRAMMING FORMULATIONS OF NONLINEAR INTEGER PROBLEMS , 1975 .

[10]  Philipp Kostuch,et al.  The University Course Timetabling Problem with a Three-Phase Approach , 2004, PATAT.

[11]  Ben Paechter,et al.  Setting the Research Agenda in Automated Timetabling: The Second International Timetabling Competition , 2010, INFORMS J. Comput..

[12]  Patric R. J. Östergård,et al.  A fast algorithm for the maximum clique problem , 2002, Discret. Appl. Math..

[13]  Tomás Müller,et al.  ITC2007 solver description: a hybrid approach , 2009, Ann. Oper. Res..

[14]  Edmund K. Burke,et al.  The Second International Timetabling Competition : Examination Timetabling Track , 2007 .

[15]  G. K. Winter,et al.  The Impact of Automated Timetabling on Universities — A Case Study , 1986 .

[16]  A. Turing On Computable Numbers, with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem. , 1937 .

[17]  Riccardo Poli,et al.  Particle swarm optimization , 1995, Swarm Intelligence.

[18]  John H. Holland,et al.  Adaptation in Natural and Artificial Systems: An Introductory Analysis with Applications to Biology, Control, and Artificial Intelligence , 1992 .

[19]  Peter J. Stuckey,et al.  A Hybrid Algorithm for the Examination Timetabling Problem , 2002, PATAT.

[20]  Salwani Abdullah,et al.  An integrated hybrid approach to the examination timetabling problem , 2011 .

[21]  Edmund K. Burke,et al.  A new model for automated examination timetabling , 2012, Ann. Oper. Res..

[22]  Edmund K. Burke,et al.  A survey of search methodologies and automated system development for examination timetabling , 2009, J. Sched..

[23]  D. de Werra,et al.  An introduction to timetabling , 1985 .

[24]  Andrea Schaerf,et al.  A Survey of Automated Timetabling , 1999, Artificial Intelligence Review.

[25]  Edmund K. Burke,et al.  An Extended Great Deluge Approach to the Examination Timetabling Problem , 2009 .

[26]  Ender Özcan,et al.  Linear Linkage Encoding in Grouping Problems: Applications on Graph Coloring and Timetabling , 2006, PATAT.

[27]  Barry McCollum,et al.  University Timetabling: Bridging the Gap between Research and Practice , 2006 .

[28]  David Meignan,et al.  Coalition-based metaheuristic: a self-adaptive metaheuristic using reinforcement learning and mimetism , 2010, J. Heuristics.

[29]  Peter Jones,et al.  Setting the Research Agenda , 2002 .

[30]  C. D. Gelatt,et al.  Optimization by Simulated Annealing , 1983, Science.

[31]  Richard M. Karp,et al.  Reducibility Among Combinatorial Problems , 1972, 50 Years of Integer Programming.

[32]  Kenneth Steiglitz,et al.  Combinatorial Optimization: Algorithms and Complexity , 1981 .

[33]  Pablo Moscato,et al.  On Evolution, Search, Optimization, Genetic Algorithms and Martial Arts : Towards Memetic Algorithms , 1989 .

[34]  Gilbert Laporte,et al.  The problem of assigning students to course sections in a large engineering school , 1986, Comput. Oper. Res..

[35]  Rong Qu,et al.  Adaptive selection of heuristics for assigning time slots and rooms in exam timetables , 2013, Applied Intelligence.

[36]  Andrea Roli,et al.  MAGMA: a multiagent architecture for metaheuristics , 2004, IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Part B (Cybernetics).

[37]  G. Dueck,et al.  Record Breaking Optimization Results Using the Ruin and Recreate Principle , 2000 .