Approximation schemes for parallel machine scheduling with availability constraints

We investigate the problems of scheduling n weighted jobs to m identical machines with availability constraints. We consider two different models of availability constraints: the preventive model where the unavailability is due to preventive machine maintenance, and the fixed job model where the unavailability is due to a priori assignment of some of the n jobs to certain machines at certain times. Both models have applications such as turnaround scheduling or overlay computing. In both models, the objective is to minimize the total weighted completion time. We assume that m is a constant, and the jobs are non-resumable. For the preventive model, it has been shown that there is no approximation algorithm if all machines have unavailable intervals even when w i = p i for all jobs. In this paper, we assume there is one machine permanently available and the processing time of each job is equal to its weight for all jobs. We develop the first PTAS when there are constant number of unavailable intervals. One main feature of our algorithm is that the classification of large and small jobs is with respect to each individual interval, thus not fixed. This classification allows us (1) to enumerate the assignments of large jobs efficiently; (2) and to move small jobs around without increasing the objective value too much, and thus derive our PTAS. Then we show that there is no FPTAS in this case unless P = NP.For fixed job model, we first show that if job weights are arbitrary then there is no constant approximation for a single machine with 2 fixed jobs or for two machines with one fixed job on each machine, unless P = NP . As the preventive model, we assume that the weight of a job is the same as its processing time for all jobs. We show that the PTAS for the preventive model can be extended to solve this problem when the number of fixed jobs and the number of machines are both constants.KeywordsSchedule ProblemCompletion TimeSingle MachineFeasible ScheduleIdentical MachineThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

We consider the problem of scheduling with renewable speed-up resources. Given m identical machines, n jobs and c different discrete resources, the task is to schedule each job non-preemptively onto one of the machines so as to minimize the makespan. In our problem, a job has its original processing time, which could be reduced by utilizing one of the resources. As resources are different, the amount of the time reduced for each job is different depending on the resource it uses. Once a resource is being used by one job, it can not be used simultaneously by any other job until this job is finished, hence the scheduler should take into account the job-to-machine assignment together with the resource-to-job assignment. We observe that, the classical unrelated machine scheduling problem is actually a special case of our problem when m=c, i.e., the number of resources equals the number of machines. Extending the techniques for the unrelated machine scheduling, we give a 2-approximation algorithm when both m and c are part of the input. We then consider two special cases for the problem, with m or c being a constant, and derive PTASes (Polynomial Time Approximation Schemes) respectively. We also establish the relationship between the two parameters m and c, through which we are able to transform the PTAS for the case when m is constant to the case when c is a constant. The relationship between the two parameters reveals the structure within the problem, and may be of independent interest.

We consider two variants of the classical bin packing problem in which items may be fragmented. This can potentially reduce the total number of bins needed for packing the instance. However, since fragmentation incurs overhead, we attempt to avoid it as much as possible. In bin packing with size increasing fragmentation (BP-SIF), fragmenting an item increases the input size (due to a header/footer of fixed size that is added to each fragment). In bin packing with size preserving fragmentation (BP-SPF), there is a bound on the total number of fragmented items. These two variants of bin packing capture many practical scenarios, including message transmission in community TV networks, VLSI circuit design and preemptive scheduling on parallel machines with setup times/setup costs.While both BP-SPF and BP-SIF do not belong to the class of problems that admit a polynomial time approximation scheme (PTAS), we show in this paper that both problems admit a dual PTAS and an asymptotic PTAS. We also develop for each of the problems a dual asymptotic fully polynomial time approximation scheme (AFPTAS). The AFPTASs are based on a non-trivial application of a fast combinatorial FPTAS for packing linear programs with negative entries, proposed recently by Garg and Khandekar [5].KeywordsApproximation SchemeParallel MachinePolynomial Time Approximation SchemeLarge ItemSmall ItemThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

In this paper, we study the parallel machine scheduling subject to machine availability constraint. The jobs can be resumed after being preempted by another job or interrupted by the unavailable intervals. The goal is to minimize the makespan subject to the constraint that the total completion time is minimized. We study two different machine unavailability models. In the first model, each machine has a single unavailable interval which starts from time 0. In the second model, each machine can have multiple unavailable intervals, but at any time, there is at most one machine unavailable. For each model, we show that there is an optimal polynomial time algorithm.

Let there be a set M of m parallel machines and a set J of n jobs, where each job j takes \(p_{i,j}\) time units on machine \(M_i\). In makespan minimization the goal is to schedule each job non-preemptively on a machine such that the length of the schedule, the makespan, is minimum. We investigate a generalization of makespan minimization on unrelated parallel machines (\(R||C_{max}\)) where J is partitioned into b bags \(B=(B_1,\dots , B_b)\), and no two jobs belonging to the same bag can be scheduled on the same machine. First we present a simple b-approximation algorithm for \(R||C_{max}\) with bags (\(R|bag|C_{max}\)). Two machines \(M_i\) and \(M_{i'}\) have the same machine type if \(p_{i,j}=p_{i',j}\) for all \(j \in J\). We give a polynomial-time approximation scheme (PTAS) for \(R|bag|C_{max}\) with machine types where both the number of machine types and bags are constant. This result infers the existence of a PTAS for uniform parallel machines when the number of machine speeds and number of bags are both constant. Then, we present a b/2-approximation algorithm for the graph balancing problem with \(b \ge 2\) bags; the approximation ratio is tight for \(b=3\) unless Open image in new window and this algorithm solves the graph balancing problem with \(b=2\) bags in polynomial time. In addition, we present a polynomial-time algorithm for the restricted assignment problem on uniform parallel machines when all the jobs have unit length. To complement our algorithmic results, we show that when the jobs have lengths 1 or 2 it is Open image in new window -hard to approximate the makespan with approximation ratio less than 3/2 for both the restricted assignment and graph balancing problems with \(b=2\) bags and \(b=3\) bags, respectively. We also prove that makespan minimization on uniform parallel machines with \(b=2\) bags is strongly Open image in new window -hard.

A faster FPTAS for knapsack problem with cardinality constraint

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to find the best approximation algorithm for solving the more general case of single‐supplier multi‐retailer capacitated economic lot‐sizing (SM‐CELS) problem in deterministic inventory theory, which is the non‐deterministic polynomial (NP)‐hard problem.Design/methodology/approachSince few theoretical results have been published on polynomial time approximation algorithms for SM‐CELS problems, this paper develops a fully polynomial time approximation scheme (FPTAS) for the problem with monotone production and holding‐backlogging cost functions. First the optimal solution of a rounded problem is presented as the approximate solution and its straightforward dynamic‐programming (DP) algorithm. Then the straightforward DP algorithm is converted into an FPTAS by exploiting combinatorial properties of the recursive function.FindingsAn FPTAS is designed for the SM‐CELS problem with monotone cost functions, which is the strongest polynomial time approximation result.Research limitations/implicationsThe main limitation is that the supplier only manufactures without holding any products when the model is applied.Practical implicationsThe paper presents the best result for the SM‐CELS problem in deterministic inventory theory.Originality/valueThe LP‐rounding technique, an effective approach to design approximation algorithms for NP‐hard problems, is successfully applied to the SM‐CELS problem in this paper.

This study addresses the scheduling problem of two identical parallel machines with the objective of minimizing the total completion time under the machine availability constraints. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to develop a fully polynomial-time approximation scheme (FPTAS), a solution method which has been neglected in past studies, to solve the studied problem. The FPTAS, which is based on a dynamic programming algorithm is developed by applying a trimming-the-state-space approach. Theoretical proofs of the error bound and the time complexity for the proposed FPTAS are also provided. The computational results indicate that the proposed FPTAS performs more efficiently than a dynamic programming algorithm in terms of both run time and problem size. The error bound of the FPTAS is demonstrated to be within the pre-specified error bound.

We present the first polynomial-time approximation scheme (PTAS), i.e., (1+e)-approximation algorithm for any constant e> 0, for the planar group Steiner tree problem (in which each group lies on a boundary of a face). This result improves on the best previous approximation factor of O(logn (loglogn)O(1)). We achieve this result via a novel and powerful technique called spanner bootstrapping, which allows one to bootstrap from a superconstant approximation factor (even superpolynomial in the input size) all the way down to a PTAS. This is in contrast with the popular existing approach for planar PTASs of constructing light-weight spanners in one iteration, which notably requires a constant-factor approximate solution to start from. Spanner bootstrapping removes one of the main barriers for designing PTASs for problems which have no known constant-factor approximation (even on planar graphs), and thus can be used to obtain PTASs for several difficult-to-approximate problems. Our second major contribution required for the planar group Steiner tree PTAS is a spanner construction, which reduces the graph to have total weight within a factor of the optimal solution while approximately preserving the optimal solution. This is particularly challenging because group Steiner tree requires deciding which terminal in each group to connect by the tree, making it much harder than recent previous approaches to construct spanners for planar TSP by Klein [SIAM J. Computing 2008], subset TSP by Klein [STOC 2006], Steiner tree by Borradaile, Klein, and Mathieu [ACM Trans. Algorithms 2009], and Steiner forest by Bateni, Hajiaghayi, and Marx [J. ACM 2011] (and its improvement to an efficient PTAS by Eisenstat, Klein, and Mathieu [SODA 2012]. The main conceptual contribution here is realizing that selecting which terminals may be relevant is essentially a complicated prize-collecting process: we have to carefully weigh the cost and benefits of reaching or avoiding certain terminals in the spanner. Via a sequence of involved prize-collecting procedures, we can construct a spanner that reaches a set of terminals that is sufficient for an almost-optimal solution. Our PTAS for planar group Steiner tree implies the first PTAS for geometric Euclidean group Steiner tree with obstacles, as well as a (2+)-approximation algorithm for group TSP with obstacles, improving over the best previous constant-factor approximation algorithms. By contrast, we show that planar group Steiner forest, a slight generalization of planar group Steiner tree, is APX-hard on planar graphs of treewidth 3, even if the groups are pairwise disjoint and every group is a vertex or an edge.

#NFA refers to the problem of counting the words of length n accepted by a non-deterministic finite automaton. #NFA is #P-hard, and although fully-polynomial-time randomized approximation schemes (FPRAS) exist, they are all impractical. The first FPRAS for #NFA had a running time of Õ(n 17 m 17 ε -14 łog(δ -1 )), where m is the number of states in the automaton, δ ∈ (0,1] is the confidence parameter, and ε > 0 is the tolerance parameter (typically smaller than 1). The current best FPRAS achieved a significant improvement in the time complexity relative to the first FPRAS and obtained FPRAS with time complexity Õ((n 10 m 2 + n 6 m 3 )ε -4 łog 2 (δ -1 )). The complexity of the improved FPRAS is still too intimidating to attempt any practical implementation. In this paper, we pursue the quest for practical FPRAS for #NFA by presenting a new algorithm with a time complexity of O(n 2 m 3 łog(nm)ε -2 łog(δ -1 )). Observe that evaluating whether a word of length n is accepted by an NFA has a time complexity of O(nm 2 ). Therefore, our proposed FPRAS achieves sub-quadratic complexity with respect to membership checks.

Scheduling hybrid flowshop with parallel batching machines and compatibilities

Robust scheduling with budgeted uncertainty

Given an interval graph and integer k, we consider the problem of finding a subgraph of size k with a maximum number of induced edges, called densest k-subgraph problem in interval graphs. It has been shown that this problem is NP-hard even for chordal graphs [17], and there is probably no PTAS for general graphs [12]. However, the exact complexity status for interval graphs is a long-standing open problem [17], and the best known approximation result is a 3-approximation algorithm [16]. We shed light on the approximation complexity of finding a densest k-subgraph in interval graphs by presenting a polynomialtime approximation scheme (PTAS), that is, we show that there is an (1+e)-approximation algorithm for any e > 0, which is the first such approximation scheme for the densest k-subgraph problem in an important graph class without any further restrictions.

We consider a batch processing system {pi : i = 1, 2,..., n} where pi is the processing time of job i, and up to B jobs can be processed together such that the handling time of a batch is the longest processing time among jobs in the batch. The number of job types m is not fixed and all the jobs are released at the same time. Jobs are executed nonpreemptively. Our objective is to assign jobs to batches and sequence the batches so as to minimize the total completion time. The best previously known result is a 2-approximation algorithm due to D. S. Hochbaum and D. Landy [6]. In this paper, we establish the first polynomial time approximation scheme (PTAS) for the problem.

The Closest Substring problem (CSP), where a short string is sought that minimizes the number of mismatches between it and each of a given set of strings, is a minimization problem with polynomial time approximation schemes. In this paper, a lower bound on approximation algorithms for the CSP problem is developed. We prove that unless the Exponential Time Hypothesis (ETH Hypothesis, i.e., not all search problems in SNP are solvable in subexponential time) fails, the CSP problem has no polynomial time approximation schemes of running time f(1/Ɛ)|x|O(1/Ɛ) for any function f, where |x| is the size of input instance. This essentially excludes the possibility that the CSP problem has a practical polynomial time approximation scheme even for moderate values of the error bound Ɛ. As a consequence, it is unlikely that the study of approximation schemes for the CSP problem in the literature would lead to practical approximation algorithms for the CSP problem for small error bound Ɛ.