In network design, the gap between theory and practice is woefully broad. This book narrows it, comprehensively and critically examining current network design models and methods. You will learn where mathematical modeling and algorithmic optimization have been under-utilized. At the opposite extreme, you will learn where they tend to fail to contribute to the twin goals of network efficiency and cost-savings. Most of all, you will learn precisely how to tailor theoretical models to make them as useful as possible in practice. Throughout, the authors focus on the traffic demands encountered in the real world of network design. Their generic approach, however, allows problem formulations and solutions to be applied across the board to virtually any type of backbone communication or computer network. For beginners, this book is an excellent introduction. For seasoned professionals, it provides immediate solutions and a strong foundation for further advances in the use of mathematical modeling for network design. (Less)

Routing, Flow, And Capacity Design In Communication And Computer Networks

A survey on problems and methods in generalized assembly line balancing

Dantzig-Wolfe decomposition and column generation, devised for linear programs, is a success story in large-scale integer programming. We outline and relate the approaches, and survey mainly recent contributions, not yet found in textbooks. We emphasize the growing understanding of the dual point of view, which has brought considerable progress to the column generation theory and practice. It stimulated careful initializations, sophisticated solution techniques for the restricted master problem and subproblem, as well as better overall performance. Thus, the dual perspective is an ever recurring concept in our "selected topics."

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Selected Topics in Column Generation

A classification of assembly line balancing problems

Assembly lines are special flow-line production systems which are of great importance in the indus-trial production of high quantity standardized commodities. Recently, assembly lines even gained importance in low volume production of customized products (mass-customization). Due to high capital requirements when installing or redesigning a line, its configuration planning is of great rele-vance for practitioners. Accordingly, this attracted attention of plenty researchers, who tried to sup-port real-world configuration planning by suited optimization models (assembly line balancing prob-lems). In spite of the enormous academic effort in assembly line balancing, there remains a consider-able gap between requirements of real configuration problems and the status of research. To ease communication between researchers and practitioners, we provide a classification scheme of assem-bly line balancing. This is a valuable step in identifying remaining research challenges which might contribute to closing the gap.

We consider the bandwidth packing problem arising from telecommunication networks. The problem is to determine the set of calls and an assignment of them to the paths in an arc-capacitated network to maximize profit. We propose an algorithm to solve the integer programming formulation of the problem. An efficient column generation technique to solve the linear programming relaxation is proposed, and a modified cover inequality is used to strengthen the IP formulation. The algorithm incorporates the column generation technique and the strong cutting plane approach into a branch-and-bound scheme. We test the proposed algorithm on some random problems. The results show that the algorithm can be used to solve the problems within reasonably small time limits.

An Integer Programming Approach to the Bandwidth Packing Problem

http://solab.kaist.ac.kr/files/papers/intl_journal/1996_4.pdf

An extended formulation approach to the edge-weighted maximal clique problem

http://solab.kaist.ac.kr/files/papers/intl_journal/1997_5.pdf

Lifting cover inequalities for the precedence-constrained knapsack problem

Modeling and solving the spatial block scheduling problem in a shipbuilding company

http://solab.kaist.ac.kr/files/papers/intl_journal/1997_3.pdf

Kyungchul Park

Papers

An Integer Programming Approach to the Bandwidth Packing Problem

An extended formulation approach to the edge-weighted maximal clique problem

Lifting cover inequalities for the precedence-constrained knapsack problem

Modeling and solving the spatial block scheduling problem in a shipbuilding company

A heuristic for an assembly line balancing problem with incompatibility, range, and partial precedence constraints