Case Based Heuristic Selection for Timetabling Problems

Burke, Edmund, Petrovic, Sanja and Qu, Rong (2006) Case Based Heuristic Selection for Timetabling Problems. Journal of Scheduling, 9 (2). pp. 99-113. (In Press)

WarningThere is a more recent version of this item available.
[img] PDF - Requires a PDF viewer such as GSview, Xpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader
Download (159kB)

Abstract

This paper presents a case-based heuristic selection approach for automated university course and exam timetabling. The method described in this paper is motivated by the goal of developing timetabling systems that are fundamentally more general than the current state of the art. Heuristics that worked well in previous similar situations are memorized in a case base and are retrieved for solving the problem in hand. Knowledge discovery techniques are employed in two distinct scenarios. Firstly, we model the problem and the problem solving situations along with specific heuristics for those problems. Secondly, we refine the case base and discard cases which prove to be non-useful in solving new problems. Experimental results are presented and analyzed. It is shown that case based reasoning can act effectively as an intelligent approach to learn which heuristics work well for particular timetabling situations. We conclude by outlining and discussing potential research issues in this critical area of knowledge discovery for different difficult timetabling problems.

Item Type: Article
Keywords: case based reasoning, course timetabling, exam timetabling, graph heuristics, knowledge discovery, meta-heuristics
Schools/Departments: University of Nottingham, UK > Faculty of Science > School of Computer Science
Depositing User: Qu, Rong
Date Deposited: 07 Feb 2006
Last Modified: 31 May 2021 14:47
URI: https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/373

Available Versions of this Item

Actions (Archive Staff Only)

Edit View Edit View