In this paper we formulate and efficiently solve staff scheduling problems for large organizations that provide continuous services to customers. We describe an integer programming approach for a class of such problems, where solutions have to obey a number of constraints related to workload...

For a given planning horizon, workforce composition and set of labor requirements, personnel scheduling often reduces to solving three problems. The first is concerned with the assignment of days off; the second involves assigning workers to shifts during the day; and the third involves the...

This paper presents a new implicit formulation for shift scheduling problems, using context-free grammars to model the rules for the composition of shifts. From the grammar, we generate an integer programming (IP) model having a linear programming relaxation equivalent to that of the classical...

We discuss the problem of combining the conflicting objectives of equity and utilitarianism, for social policy making, in a single mathematical programming model. The definition of equity we use is the Rawlsian one of maximizing the minimum utility over individuals or classes of individuals....

This paper presents an algorithm for efficiently sequencing the cutting operations associated with the manufacture of discrete parts on a CNC machine. The problem is first modeled as an integer program but recast via Lagrangian relaxation as a min-cut problem on a bipartite network. Tight lower...

A highly automated, real-time dispatch system is described which uses embedded optimization routines to replace extensive manual operations and to reduce substantially operating costs for a nation-wide fleet of petroleum tank trucks. The system is currently used in daily operations by the Order...

Erratum to Mairs, Thomas G., Glenn W. Wakefield, Ellis L. Johnson, Kurt Spielberg. 1978. On a production allocation and distribution problem. Management Sci. 24 (November).

This paper proposes using nonlinear mixed-integer programming to solve the customized bundle-pricing problem in which consumers are allowed to choose up to N goods out of a larger pool of J goods. Prior work has suggested that this mechanism has attractive features for the pricing of information...

The Tactical Decision Problem (TDP) associated with oil spill clean up operations prescribes the time-phased allocation of available components over the planning horizon so that the clean up requirement at each critical time point is met. The objective is to minimize response time to allow for...

In this paper¹, we consider an integer convex optimization problem where the objective function is the sum of separable convex functions (that is, of the form \sum _{(i,j)\epsilonQ}F\bar _ij(w_ij) + \sum _i\epsilonPB\bar _i(\mu _i)), the constraints are similar to those arising in the dual of a minimum...