ILS-ESP: An efficient, simple, and parameter-free algorithm for solving the permutation flow-shop problem

Angel A. Juan, Helena Ramalhinho-Lourenço (), Manuel Mateo, Quim Castellà and Barry B. Barrios

Economics Working Papers from Department of Economics and Business, Universitat Pompeu Fabra

Abstract: From a managerial point of view, the more effcient, simple, and parameter-free (ESP) an algorithm is, the more likely it will be used in practice for solving real-life problems. Following this principle, an ESP algorithm for solving the Permutation Flowshop Sequencing Problem (PFSP) is proposed in this article. Using an Iterated Local Search (ILS) framework, the so-called ILS-ESP algorithm is able to compete in performance with other well-known ILS-based approaches, which are considered among the most effcient algorithms for the PFSP. However, while other similar approaches still employ several parameters that can affect their performance if not properly chosen, our algorithm does not require any particular fine-tuning process since it uses basic "common sense" rules for the local search, perturbation, and acceptance criterion stages of the ILS metaheuristic. Our approach defines a new operator for the ILS perturbation process, a new acceptance criterion based on extremely simple and transparent rules, and a biased randomization process of the initial solution to randomly generate different alternative initial solutions of similar quality -which is attained by applying a biased randomization to a classical PFSP heuristic. This diversification of the initial solution aims at avoiding poorly designed starting points and, thus, allows the methodology to take advantage of current trends in parallel and distributed computing. A set of extensive tests, based on literature benchmarks, has been carried out in order to validate our algorithm and compare it against other approaches. These tests show that our parameter-free algorithm is able to compete with state-of-the-art metaheuristics for the PFSP. Also, the experiments show that, when using parallel computing, it is possible to improve the top ILS-based metaheuristic by just incorporating to it our biased randomization process with a high-quality pseudo-random number generator.

Keywords: Flow-Shop Problem; Scheduling; Randomized Algorithms; Iterated Local Search; Metaheuristics; GRASP (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C63 M11 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cmp
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