Production planning:

operations scheduling
with applications in
manufacturing and services
Erwin Hans (T&M-OMST)
BB-235, tel. 3523,
e.w.hans@sms.utwente.nl

Johann Hurink (TW-STOR)

J.L.Hurink@math.utwente.nl

Faculty of Technology and

Management
University of Twente

Literature

Book: Operations Scheduling with applicati

in manufacturing and services
Authors: M. Pinedo, X. Chao

Handouts, also downloadable from website

Exam
These methods must be learned entirely
(one or two questions about these will be in the exam):
adaptive search
branch-and-bound, beam-search
shifting bottleneck
The idea (approach) and application of all other discussed
methods must be learned (i.e., no formulas)

One question will be asked about the software demonstrat

Aside from the discussed chapters from the book,
the handouts must be learned

Scheduling: definition
Allocation of jobs to scarce resources
the types of jobs and resources depend
on the specific situation
Combinatorial optimization problem
maximize/minimize objective
subject to constraints

Application areas
Manufacturing, e.g.:
job shop / flow shop scheduling
workforce scheduling
tool scheduling

Services, e.g.:
Hotel / airline reservation systems
Hospitals (operating rooms)

Transportation and distribution, e.g.:

vehicle scheduling, and routing
railways

Application areas (cont.)

Information processing and
communications:
CPUs, series and parallel computing
call centers

Time-tabling, e.g.:
lecture planning at a University
soccer competition
flight scheduling

Warehousing, e.g.:
AGV scheduling, and routing

Maintenance, e.g.:
scheduling maintenance of a fleet of ships

Scheduling in manufacturing
Due to increasing market competition,
companies strive to:
shorten delivery times
increase variety in end-products
shorten production lead times
increase resource utilization
improve quality, reduce WIP
prevent production disturbances
(machine breakdowns)
--> more products in less time!

Different types of
manufacturing control

Make and assemble to stock

Make to stock, assemble to order
Make to order
Engineer to order

Scheduling in a manufacturing
planning and control framework
Long range forecasting and sales planning
Facility and resources planning
Demand management, aggregate and
workforce planning
Order acceptance and resource group
loading
Shop floor scheduling, workforce
scheduling

Relations with other

management areas
Product and process design
Process planning
Inventory management and materials
planning
Purchasing and procurement
management
Warehousing and physical distribution

Scheduling in services
Workforce Scheduling in

Call Centers
Hospitals
Employment agencies
Schools, universities

Reservation Systems in

Airlines
Hotels
Car Rentals
Travel Agencies

Postal services

Our approach
Scheduling problem
Problem
formulation
Model
Solve with
algorithms
Conclusions

Scheduling models

Job shop scheduling

Project scheduling
Flexible Assembly Systems
Lot sizing and scheduling
Workforce scheduling, staffing
Interval scheduling, reservation
systems, timetabling

Scheduling algorithms
General solution Techniques:
Mathematical programming
linear, non-linear, (mixed) integer programming

Exact methods (enumeration)

branch-and-bound
dynamic programming
cutting plane / column generation methods

Local search methods, heuristics

simulated annealing
k-opt methods
tabu search
genetic algorithms
adaptive search

neural networks

Scheduling algorithms (cont.)

Heuristics
dispatching rules
composite dispatching rules
beam-search

Decomposition Techniques
Temporal decomposition (rolling horizon
approach)
Machine decomposition (Shifting Bottleneck)

Hybrid Methods
combined usage of scheduling methods

Important characteristics of
optimization techniques
Quality of Solutions Obtained
(How Close to Optimal?)
Amount of CPU-Time Needed
(Real-Time on a PC?)
Ease of Development and Implementation
(How much time needed to code,
test, adjust and modify)
Implementation costs
(Are expensive LP-solvers required?)

Value
Objectiv
e
Functio
n

Dispatching
Rules
Local
Search
Beam
Search

Branch and Bound

CPU Time

Consideration of software
companies w.r.t. optimization
techniques costs
Implementation
(Are expensive LP-solvers required? Easy to
implement?)
vs.

What solution quality does the customer

online scheduling
offline schedulin
require?
(Is an immediate answer required, or are long
calculations allowed? Does customer accept
complex solutions?)

Commercial Packages
ERP-SYSTEMS
SAP, Baan, JD Edwards, People Soft, Navision, MFG Pro
GENERAL OPTIMIZATION
Ilog, Dash, MINTO, OSL (IBM), XPRESS-MP, OML, XA
GENERAL SCHEDULING
I2, Cybertec, AutoSimulation, IDS Professor Scheer,
ORTEC
SCHEDULING OIL AND PROCESS INDUSTRIES
Haverly Systems, Chesapeake, Finity, ORTEC
SCHEDULING CONSUMER PRODUCTS
Manugistics, Numetrix
SCHEDULING WORKFORCE IN CALL CENTERS
AIX, TCS, Siebel

Decision Support Systems

Important issues in design of DSS:
Database design and management
Data collection (e.g. barcoding system)
Module Design and Interfacing
GUI Design (Gantt-charts, etc.)
Design of link between GUI and algorithm
library (data organization before transfer)
Internal Re-optimization
External Re-optimization

GUIS should allow:

Interactive Optimization
Freezing Jobs and Re-optimizing
Creating New Schedules by Combining
Different Parts from Different Schedules

Cascading and Propagation Effects

After a Change or Mutation by the User, the
system:
does Feasibility Analysis
takes care of Cascading and Propagation
Effects,
does Internal Re-optimization

Graphics user interfaces for

scheduling production
processes

Gantt Chart Interface

Dispatch List Interface
Time Buckets (resource capacity loading)
Throughput Diagrams
Time tables

Important objectives to be
displayed
Due Date Related
Number of late jobs
Maximum lateness
Average lateness, tardiness

Productivity and Inventory Related

Total Setup Time
Total Machine Idle Time
Average Time Jobs Remain in System, WIP

Resource usage
resource shortage