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1 Introduction
With these guidelines we are trying to lead students step-by-step towards solving the mrp and MRP II instances taken from the study book Introduction to Computational Optimization Models for Production Planning in a Supply Chain by Stefan Vo and David L. Woodruff (cf. 7.1). The software we are using is AMPL under Windows XP operating system. There are two ways in which AMPL is being provided by www.ampl.com, i.e., a web interface and the downloadable AMPL Student Edition (AMPL-SE). Either way multiple solvers may be used; among these within AMPL-SE is CPLEX which will be used.1
AMPL Homepage
First one needs to download AMPL-SE zip-package from www.ampl.com and extract it to a local directory. Follow the link in Figure 1!
L1
L3
L2
Here you may be interested in the following links: L1: free download of Chapter 1 of the AMPL book. L2: amplcml.zip depicts the zipped archive of AMPL-SE L3: instructions on how to use AMPL-SE We are following L2 and will be prompted to specify what to do with the download. We choose to download the archive to the root folder of our local drive C, e.g. C:\, which will keep the path to ampl.exe short. Next unzip the archive. As a result there should be a new folder C:\amplcml containing the ready-to-use Student Edition.
We now have to change into the ampl folder and start ampl, cf. the first two prompts in the window above. For configuring CPLEX as the solver to be used, we have to enter options solver cplex;. Now we are set to use AMPL-SE with CPLEX!
5 Solving
In order to solve the loaded instance we have to type solve;. As a result we obtain information about the solution process. Our problem instance has been solved by five iterations of the dual simplex algorithm and the objective function value is 530.
The model and problem instances may be found at this website: http://faculty.gsm.ucdavis.edu/~dlw/scm.html
We now can see when and in which period to release the orders of a certain SKU. For further information the reader may be directed to the study book mentioned above as well as the free download of the first chapter of the AMPL book.