We study a class of scheduling problems involving the maximumlateness criterion and an element of batching. For all the problemsthat we examine, algorithms appear in the literature which consistof a sorting step to determine an optimal job sequence, followedby a dynamic programming step which...

In this paper, we consider deterministic (both fluid and discrete) polling systems with N queues with infinite buffers and we show how to compute the best polling sequence (minimizing the average total workload). With two queues, the best polling sequence is always periodic when the system is...

In this paper we study a challenging call center operation problem. The goal of our analysis is to identify an optimal policy for allocating tasks to agents. As a first step, we discuss promising randomized policies and use stochastic approximation for finding the optimal randomized policy when...

We formulate a horizontal differentiation model with price-sensitive demand and asymmetric transport costs, in the context of transport scheduling. Two competitors choose fares and departure times in a fixed time interval. Consumers are distributed uniformly along the interval; their location...

We consider equilibrium and optimum use of a Vickrey road bottleneck, distinguishing between long-run and short-run scheduling preferences in an otherwise stylized scheduling model. The preference structure reflects that there is a distinction between the (exogenous) 'long-run preferred arrival...

A single round robin tournament (SRRT) consists of n teams and a set of periods. Matches between the teams have to be scheduled such that each team plays against each other team exactly once and each team plays at most once per period. In order to establish fairness among teams we consider a...

We introduce a new class of valid inequalities for the maximum round robin tournament (MRRT) problem. They strengthen the linear relaxation and improve the upper bound. We also answer negatively the question of Briskorn if the optimal objective value of the MRRT problem and that of its...

This paper studies the allocation of buffer times in a single machine environment. Buffer times are a common tool to protect the schedule against disruptions such as machine failures. We introduce new classes of robust machine scheduling problems. For an arbitrary scheduling problem 1