Iterative optimization techniques using man–machine interaction for university timetabling problems

We focus on a timetabling problem of university makeup classes and construct a scheduling system based on man–machine interaction which enables to reveal the essential and additional information of the problem domain. In this problem, makeup classes which are requested by the lecturers have to be scheduled to a specified time slot under the hard/soft constraints, e.g., schedules of the lecturers and the students. A constraint based scheduling model is newly introduced and several parameters of the model are settled through the repetition of the solution evaluation by the operators. Through the numerical experiment with the actual data, the potential of the proposed approach is examined.