A proven optimal result for a benchmark instance of the uncapacitated examination timetabling problem

Angelos Dimitsas (), Christos Gogos (), Christos Valouxis (), Vasileios Nastos () and Panayiotis Alefragis ()
Additional contact information
Angelos Dimitsas: University of Ioannina
Christos Gogos: University of Ioannina
Christos Valouxis: University of Patras
Vasileios Nastos: University of Ioannina
Panayiotis Alefragis: University of Peloponnese

Journal of Scheduling, 2025, vol. 28, issue 2, No 3, 183-194

Abstract: Abstract Examination timetabling is a problem well known to the scheduling community. Its simplest version, which is the uncapacitated examination timetabling problem, is easily described and comprehended. Nevertheless, proof of optimality is notoriously difficult even for moderate size problems. In this paper, we describe the effort that our team exercised in finally proving the optimality of the sta83 instance of Carter’s dataset. The problem was decomposed naturally in three parts and for each part a different approach managed to prove optimality of the currently best known solution. This work also presents optimal solutions to subproblems that exist in various public datasets problems and two best known solutions of such problems.

Keywords: Examination timetabling; Mixed integer programming; Heuristics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10951-024-00805-0 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:jsched:v:28:y:2025:i:2:d:10.1007_s10951-024-00805-0

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/10951

DOI: 10.1007/s10951-024-00805-0

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Scheduling is currently edited by Edmund Burke and Michael Pinedo

More articles in Journal of Scheduling from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().