ReDS-A Dynamic Planning, Scheduling, and
Control System for Manufacturing
K. Hadavi, M. S. Shahraray, K. Voigt, Siemens Corporate Research, Inc., Princeton, NJ
Abstract
Classical scheduling theory has not solved the
practical needs of factory management. Management
objectives are often many, ill-defined, and changing.
Management is generally interested in decision sup-
port tools to facilitate specification of changed objec-
tives, to react to shop floor changes, and to make short
and long-term planning decisions. This paper
describes a dynamic, intelligent, real-time factory
scheduling system known as Requirements Driven
Scheduling (REDS). ReDS combines Artificial Intelli-
gence (AI) and Operational Research (OR) techniques
to find solutions that are not always optimal but are
acceptable to the changing needs of management.
ReDS uses a number of techniques such as least
commitment planning and abstraction in order to make
a plan. To optimize the allocation of resources, heuris-
tics are applied from order and shop-floor points of
view. ReDS works in time and event-driven modes of
operation. ReDS uses real-time data for two purposes;
short term feedback to reconfigure the current sched-
ule, and long-term feedback to adjust heuristics. Using
this feedback, ReDS can automatically conform the
factory in which it operates. An essential partner for
ReDS operation is a data collection and equipment
monitoring system. The results of coupling ReDS to a
real-time data collection system in a VLSI development
line are encouraging. The data collection system
receives data from and returns instructions to the shop
floor.
Keywords: Manufacturing Decision Support Sys-
tems, Planning, Scheduling, Real-Time Shop-Floor
Control, Job Release Control.
Scheduling Problems in
Manufacturing
Scheduling problem may be generalized as ari
allocation of m jobs to n resources satisfying certain
constraints. These constraints may include cost, due
date, and resource utilization. Generally, this prob-
lem is NP-hard. In manufacturing, there is an added
332
complexity of the environment's dynamics. The
environment has serious implications in that even if
one could arrive at a solution to the problem, the
solution may soon become invalid because the
original assumptions may now be false. Like other
scheduling problems, the scheduling of manufactur-
ing environments faces the problem of conflict of
interests. However, unlike many environments, fac-
tory scheduling deals with indeterminable events.
Random-like behavior is commonly observed in
machine breakdown patterns, product quality assur-
ance, vendor delivery, operator availability, order
quantities, etc. In sumnmry, characteristics of the
factory scheduling problem are:
1. A wide variety of constraints.
2. Indeterminable behavior of events (constraint
dynamics), z
3. Nonuniform variety of manufacturing disci-
plines, e.g. job-shop, flowline, mass-
manufacturing, etc.
Based on the aforementioned characteristics, a
factory scheduling system should possess certain
desirable features:
a) Constraint Satisfaction
The ability or attempt to satisfy various
classes of constraints ranging from manage-
ment objectives to tool availability and vendor
tardiness. This feature would entail the ability
to represent all classes of constraints.
b) Flexibility
The ability to adjust or reconfigure the solu-
tion when and if a perturbation causes a
violation of original assumptions.
c) Obscure and Incomplete Information
The ability to find and propose solutions in the
presence of obscure and/or incomplete infor-
mation. For example, approximate vendor
delivery dates.

d) Response Time
The time taken for the svstem to search for a
new solution when one or more of the original
assumptions change. This is important for
supporting interactive use.
e) Abstraction of Information
The coordination of several agents ranging
from machine tools to the general managers'
expertise. The factory scheduling system
should be capable of dealing with the "'right"
information at the time and place needed.
Furthermore, the infornmtion should be pro-
cessed and presented as a decision or recom-
mendation.
f) Applicability
Different manufacturing operations have dif-
ferent characteristics. Such characteristics are
governed mostly by the dynamics of the
environment. For example, mass manufactur-
ing, batch manufacturing, and job shop envi-
ronments each have very unique characteris-
tics. However, there are industries, e.g. VLSI
wafer fabrication 3, where a mixed and com-
plex characteristic is observed. In the latter
situation, one may find a job shop character-
istic with long lead times, very frequent
machine breakdowns, and random low yield.
Adding to the problem, the process plans may
have to be decided dynamically, based on
results of sudden test runs injected into the
system.
g) User Friendliness
User, herein, implies both human user as well
as computer system that may have to interact
with the system. For example, the real-time
data collection software and/or the manufac-
turing database are among the potential users.
h) Feedback
The ability to detect, analyze, and act when a
problem or trend persists over a considerable
time period. An example of such a problem or
trend is the slow detectable deterioration of
machine performance, leading to work center
overload, poor product quality, and machine
breakdown.
i) Optimal Solutions
The production of a solution that satisfies
constraints and provides the most desirable
result.
333
J~)urnal ~" Manufiwturing Systems
Volume 9/No. 4
Previous Approaches to
Scheduling in Manufacturing
In the past, efforts to provide solutions to sched-
uling problems have been predominantly analytical
in nature. However, analytical approaches aimed at
optimal solutions are feasible only for a small subset
of scheduling problems that assume highly idealized
conditions, few machines, and a small number of
jobs. Recently in AI research, the use of heuristic
methods to find suboptimal and/or acceptable solu-
tions to scheduling problems with size and complex-
ity comparable to real manufacturing environments
has been proposed. 2"4"s'6"7"8
Analytical approaches have dealt mostly with
idealized abstractions of a manufacturing shop.
With this approach many simplifying assumptions
have been made. The first step toward reducing the
problem is to specialize the general problem of
job-shop scheduling to the less complex problem of
scheduling a flow shop. The difference between
job-shop and flow-shop scheduling is that all jobs
follow identical paths through the machines
whereas job-shop paths can be different for each
job. The following list shows some other simplify-
ing assumptions that can be made.
1. The tasks to be performed are well defined
and completely known.
2. Resources and facilities are entirely speci-
fied.
3. The sequence of the tasks' elemental activi-
ties is known.
4. Each machine is continuously available.
5. Jobs are strictly-ordered sequences of oper-
ations, without assembly operation.
6. There is no rework.
7. Each operation can be performed by only
one machine on the shop floor.
8. There is only one machine of each type on
the shop floor.
9. There is no preemption (undoing of previous
allocations.)
10. The processing times of a particular job's
successive operations may not overlap.
I 1. Each machine can handle only one job at a
time.
Although assumptions I, 2, 3, and 9 frequently
occur in real production lines, the remaining
assumptions usually do not. Consequently, any
Journal of Mt~nt~t~cturino S~ ~tem.~
Volume 9,No. 4
schedule generated with this idealized and simpli-
fied situation in mind becomes an inadequate solu-
tion to the problem.
Furthermore, the size of analytically-treated
scheduling problems in terms of job number and
m a c h i n e s , is very restricted. E x a m p l e s in
literature 9"~° do not go beyond cases of two jobs
and/or two machines. Considering that a problem
with rz jobs and m machines has (n!)" possible
schedules, standard procedures such as enumera-
tion, integer programming, or branch and bound
method quickly become computationatly impracti-
cal.
M a t e r i a l R e q u i r e m e n t s P l a n n i n g (MRP)
systems ~ are a family of scheduling systems widely
used in existing factories. Schedules are generated
by a very rigid and simplistic analytical algorithm.
An MRP system receives a set of orders as input.
The system knows the routings and estimated lead-
times associated with each order; and based on this
information backschedules to compute the start
times of each order. This method unrealistically
assumes that the shop floor is " e m p t y " at the
beginning of each start, and that an infinite amount
of machine capacity and all the raw materials
needed are available.
Consequently, in real manufacturing environ-
ments with limited machine capacities and material
availability, the MRP-generated schedules are cor-
rected constantly by the users of the system. Mod-
ifying a schedule to accomodate a new order may
adversely affect the already successfully scheduled
orders.
Accomplishing this task to "perfection" tends to
exceed human capabilities, and errors are likely to
be made. In a succeeding generation of MRP sys-
tems, efforts have been made to automate the
schedule adjustment phase; however, these sys-
tems' achievements do not go beyond pinpointing
trouble-spots in the MRP-generated schedule. The
user still faces the burden of rearranging the sched-
ule to resolve the problems detected automatically.
The latter system is frequently called Manufacturing
Resource Planning II (MRP II).
When comparing characteristics of MRP systems-
with desired features of a scheduling system, it is
evident that MRP does not offer these features. MRP
systems are highly rigid programs operating under
idealized assumptions. Due to long response time,
334
each run may take up to several days; therefore.
when there are abrupt and unexpected changes on
the shop floor, questions concerning schedule
reconfiguration remain unanswered.
In MRP systems, various constraints imposed by
a given manufacturing environment are considered
only for the purpose of adjusting the suggested
schedule after it is generated. ISIS-I 1"12, however, is
a "constraint-directed" scheduling system. This
systems generates schedules explicitly through
organizational (work in process, resources, cost,
etc.), physical, routing, and general preference
constraints. The heuristic method of beam search is
employed to construct solutions to given scheduling
problems incrementally. In the search tree, opera-
tors expand nodes by introducing new bindings of
operations, machines, and queues. Each path, from
the root of the tree to some descendent node,
describes a schedule that may be partial and need
further expansion for completion. At each node in
the search tree, a subset of the original constraints is
used to rate the quality of the current partial
schedule. If the rating flails below a certain thresh-
old, the entire path is discarded or kept for expan-
sion.
The desired feature of flexibility requires easy
rescheduling when the original assumptions have
been violated, as during machine breakdowns. Dis-
ruptions should be kept to a minimum, in terms of
computational eflbrt to reconfigure the schedule and
easy implementation of the needed changes on the
shop floor. In a case where a schedule needs to be
altered to accommodate changes in constraints,
ISIS-II reruns a beam search with changed search
operators to accommodate the altered constraints.
An attempt is made to economize computation by
rescheduling the affected orders only, leaving
untouched as many previous resource allocations as
possible. This keeps the amount of consequent
physical changes on the shop floor to a minimum. In
ISIS-II, the entire order affected by changes in
constraints is rescheduled. It is desirable and often
possible to reschedule only the "affected" portion
of the order. This further decreases the potential
disturbance of earlier resource allocations.
Heuristic systems generally mix a number of
"good rules" in order to generate a " g o o d " sched-
ule. This approach can be very deceiving because
only local optimization is considered when such

rules are employed. Expert systems generally tbl-
low this approach. These systems use some heuris-
tics to produce an acceptable schedule and employ
more rules for "'reactive scheduling". 4" t3 Global
measures, i.e. management objectives are directly
taken into account, This problem also appears in
distributed scheduling systems, where a local role is
used to schedule a machine to create more problems
for another machine line. In contrast, ReDS
employs management objectives and local con-
straints to produce an acceptable schedule.
Requirements Driven Scheduling
(REDS) Architecture
This scheduling system is aimed at creating more
flexibility in reacting to shop-floor changes that
inwdidate a suggested schedule, In constructing a
new schedule, the old schedule is maintained mak-
ing changes only where needed. Additionally, the
system's feature of information abstraction allows
further reduction of disruptions in a schedule caused
by violated assumptions. Consider a long-term
schedule (six months) which constructs to such
detail that daily hours of resources are allocated to
the order. Within six months changes in numerous
aspects of the mant.facturing environment are
expected. Many alterations of the schedule will take
place. Much of the potentially-wasted computation
time is saved when schedules are formulated at a
higher level of abstraction. Changes that affect
low-level aspects of manufacturing will not cause
conflicts with the previously-generated, long-term
schedules.
In ReDS two policies are important: keeping
disturbances by constraint changes minimal to
absorb some of the problem's disruptive dynamics
(locality axiom), and committing minimal resources
to maintain maximal flexibility to local changes.
The basic architecture of the system is a recursive
structure of constraint pools. Each constraint pool
represents the local (physical) constraints over a
period of time. The periods are totally arbitrary
except that each period unravels into smaller periods
at the next level of recursion. Furthermore, each
constraint pool (cp) for an interval of time: i, CP(i),
represents a set such that there exists a mapping, aj~,
from UCP(j) to CP (i) if all values of j are
335
Journal of ManuJacturing Systems
Volume 9/No. 4
descendent of i. This mapping is referred to as the
abstraction function. If I = UCP(j) such that all js
are descendent of some i, then we say that I is an
implementation of CP(i). Alternatively, CP(i) is the
specification of I. Figure 1 depicts an instance of
the constraint pools.
Note that if aji is an abstraction function mapping
UCP(j) to CP(i) and aik is an abstraction function
mapping UCP(i) to CP(k) then ajk, the functional
composition of aji and aik, maps UCP(j) to CP(k).
With every level of recursion, h., we define a
global constraint pool CP (,k). The global constraint
pools refer to management objectives and goals
such as trends in products, efficiency consider-
ations, uniform work loads, etc. The local con-
straint pools CP(i) refer to physical constraints such
as capacity, tool, labor, etc. Given that the abstrac-
tion function follows the rule of functional compo-
sition, then the "Implementation Relation" is tran-
sitive. This implies that a physical factory is an
implementation of the constraint pool CP(year 88).
It is also an implementation of the month CP(June
88), etc. Alternatively CP(year 88) is a specification
of the factory. A requirement is a partial ordering of
actions and a set of constraints. A requirement, r, is
realized by a CP(i) at level h, if the implementation
of CP(i), at level ,k + 1 realizes r. Needless to say,
the recursive definition of realizability has a fixed
point at the physical factory level where the actions
of the requirement are realized by the machines
without violating the associated set of constraints. A
requirement, r, is realized by a level, k, if r is
more det
Figure 1
Internal Representation of T i m e W i n d o w s in ReDS
Jourmtl of ,l,lant{:~lcturitlg S~ ~tem.~
Volume 9,,No. 4
realized by some CP(R) at level X-I ( X > l ) and
CP(R) "'is not violated." For example, a constraint
in CP(R) could be "'minimum horizon planning,"
that defines how far and to which nodes realization
can be extended. In order to find an implementation
that can realize a requirement, two phases are
involved. First, a "feasibility analysis" determines
the feasibility of a requirement in a qualitative
sense. Next "'detailed scheduling," based on the
recommendations of the feasibility analysis, deter-
mines the location of the best implementation that
can realize the requirement. Before describing these
functions we introduce one more concept, viz. the
essence of a requirement.
Let r = < a , c > be a requirement where a is a
partial ordering and c is a set of constraints (first
order predicates). Then r' = < a ' , c ' > is called
the e s s e n c e of r if a' is a partial ordering which is
isomorphic to a such that certain actions J;., 1_<-iN
N where (J'~,,O'~,) • a with m,n<=N, are renanaed as
mtll. And c' C c.
For example if:
r = <{(get metal,milling), (get polish,polishing)
(milling,cutting), (cutting,polishing)}, {ready
(metal,day 4), ready (cutting,day 5) ..... ready
(polish,day 6), ready (polishing,day 6)}>.
Then r' may be defined as the following: (Note
that cutting is not nullified because it is done on
a bottleneck machine; and metal is also consid-
ered to be a critical inventory item.)
r ' = < { ( g e t metal,null), (null,null), (null,cut-
ting), (cutting,null)}, {ready (metal,day4), ready
(cutting, day 5)}>.
Implementation
The functionality of individual modules in ReDS
are mentioned in order to describe in detail how the
aforementioned ideas are implemented, in schedul-
ing new incoming orders and updating current
orders. F i g u r e 2 depicts the connectivity of these
modules. ReDS was originall3, written in prolog for
prototyping purposes; for its actual use it was
rewritten in a combination of C and pascal on an
Apollo workstation.
336
Preprocessing
This is the first module through which a new
order must pass. In order to prune the search tree as
early as possible, the ReDS preprocessor decides the
minimum time needed to schedule an order given all
the needed resources. Furthermore, based on cus-
tomer requirements, the preprocessor defines a
boundary on the starting time of the order so that
either forward scheduling or backward scheduling
has a cut off point in the scheduling tree of time
periods. For example, the most urgent orders' cut
off point would be today since we cannot start the
order in the past. After preprocessing, the e s s e n c e
of the order is formed before it is passed on to the
next phase, feasibility analysis. The e s s e n c e of an
order is all the critical resources needed and the
range of time in which they are needed to satisfy the
desired due date. For example, bottleneck work
centers, type A inventories, and especially, jigs and
fixtures can contribute in forming the essence of an
order.
Feasibility Analysis (FA)
In order to detect the problem areas, the feasibil-
ity analysis (FA) uses the e s s e n c e of the order as
input and examines certain key resources such as
bottleneck work centers, critical inventory items,
and other crucial constraints so that with little
computation one of the following answers is
received:
• Impossible to satisfy the requirement (order).
• Conditional realization of the requirements.
Incoming Orders
Cu~lomet
I Preprocessing ]
T ~ MANAGEMENT
• I " ]
Seooeno,oo,OS ,
I
----Jl
=.oo,,eo,,oo I
./
........ "~-_ _ _ Shop Floor _ -/__ ....
Figure 2
Architecture of ReDS
 Journal ~g'Manufacturing Systems
Volume 9/No. 4

• Based on some relaxation of either the require- The above tree structure can be represented by a
ments or constraints or both, the order can be predicate:
realized. The required relaxations are passed on
to the next phase. range (L, W, [minchild(L, W). maxchild(L, W)]).
• No serious problems detected.
where L • {y,q,m,w,d}, W • {1 .... D}.
Such a qualitative analysis will tell whether the
search space should be extended for detailed sched- For L = d and all W • {1 ..... D}, the range is
uling, or whether time should not be wasted. defined by:
In summary, the FA checks to see if the essence
range (d,W, [0,01).
of r can be realized and if not, what can be relaxed
to obviate the problem. Relaxation of constraints This indicates that nodes in the daily level do not
may include adding shifts, extending due dates, and have descendants. In the following example (L,W)
pre-emptying existing orders. A more important denote the window with number W on level L. The
task of FA checks for consistency of starting the functions minchildL,W) and maxchild(L.W) map
order on the proposed schedule with management each (L,W) into its child with minimum and maxi-
objectives. In other words, it looks at the shop-floor mum number (integer) respectively. Both functions
requirements of the order and their availability, and are undefined for all (L,W) for which " r a n g e " is
checks the impact of introducing this order based on undefined. For all other cases minchild and max-
management objectives. The technique for doing child are defined:
this analysis is described in Reference 14, where a
job release technique is introduced to globally 4W-3, i f L = y
balance to manager's specifications the ratio minchild (L,W) = 3W-2, if L = q
between jobs completed on time and machine utili- 4 W - 3 , if L = m
zation. For more detail regarding the Factory Order 7W-6, i l L = w
Release Control and Evaluation (FORCE) algo- 0, i f L = d
rithm, the reader is referred to References 14 and
4W, if L = v
15. If the FORCE algorithm or relaxation of due date
ma.rchild (L, W) = 3W, i f L = q
requires a change in the schedule proposed by the
4W, if L = m
preprocessor, the remainder of the order is sent back
7W, if L = w
to the preprocessor for adjustment of starting times
0, i f L = d
for the remaining steps.
Also note that for all integers l, k
l < k iff (Lev, l) before (Lev, k).
Detailed Scheduling (DS)
After a new order has passed through the FA
module, it enters the detailed scheduling phase.
. . . . . . . . . Y (years)
Suppose the order is to produce N pieces of some
item. Detailed scheduling determines how many of
these N pieces are to be produced in each quarter,
month, week, and day of future time. Start date and
due date of each order are decided by the FA
module. This allows detailed scheduling to focus on
only those quarters, months, weeks, and days that
fall within these two dates, i.e. only a " s l i c e " of the
original hierarchy of time windows is relevant for
scheduling this order. Figure 3 shows the number-
ing scheme for the nodes (windows) of the hierar-
chy, and a more formal specification of the " f o c u s " Figure 3
of detailed scheduling is given. Numbering of Time Windows

337
Journal of ,1,1anufitcturing Systems
Volume 9:No. 4

For a window (L, W ) the focus of detailed sched-

uling is specified in the predicate:
focus (L,W,[l,k]).
where range (L,W, [minchild (L,W), ma.whild
(L, W)]), and
minchild (L, W) = < l = <k<ma.vchild (L, W ),
and start date before -or-in (L,/), and
due date after-or-in (L,k).
Figure 4 highlights some of the loci in the
collection of scheduling foci between startdate =
day 41 and due date = day 120.
Once the foci of detailed scheduling have been
determined, the task consists of partitioning the
requested quantity of N pieces into quarterly sub-
quantities N(q,i), N(q,i + 1) .... N(q,i + k), where
Jbcus (y,l,[i,i + k]). For each quarter (q,j),
i = < j = < i + k, N(q,j) is to be partitioned into
monthly subquantities N(m,l), where n = < 1 = < m
and focus (q,j[n,m]). The partitioning of the
requested quantity for each node into subquantities
for each of the descendants in focus continues until
quantities are scheduled for each day. Formally, this
can be stated as follows:
If the predicate order (L,W, Rw) indicates that for
window (L,W) a quantity of R~t, pieces of some
product has been scheduled, and the focus is focus
(L,W) D"I, f 2 ] ) , then on the level of children, i.e.
succ (L), a set of predicates should be sought:
{order (succ(L),j,R) where J l = < j = < f 2 }
A partition of Rw into Rj's should be formed such
that Ej Rj = Rw.
In the rest of this section, we introduce the idea of
a heuristic algorithm to compute the partitions in a
way that is driven by the various constraints of
factory scheduling.
Constraints in manufacturing can be of global or
local nature. Global constraints are valid throughout
the entire hierarchy of time windows, i.e. on each
level and within each window. The due date is a
global constraint. Local constraints apply to a spe-
cific window only. For example, the available
capacity of some workcenter during a particular
week locally constrains possible capacity alloca--
tions in this week. Among constraints, one can
distinguish critical constraints from constraints of
minor importance. The importance of constraints
may vary depending on the type of factory.
s ~ s~ I]
_: . . . . ,.,-(
Figure 4
Planning Horizons in ReDS
Constraint-driven scheduling systems generate
solutions that do not violate any of the "driving
constraints." In contrast, scheduling systems first
generate a solution by some procedure and then test
this solution against the constraints. In ReDS an
intermediate strategy was favored. The critical con-
straint of capacity availability is used to drive the
generation of a schedule first; all other constraints
are then used to test this schedule. The schedule is
considered to be a solution if it passes all tests.
An algorithm Load-Leveling 16 was developed
that uses the capacity constraints to generate a
tentative schedule while staying within the limits of
available capacity. This algorithm brings about a
desirable form of work load distribution. Work load
is the number of hours on a work center that have
been reserved for currently pending orders. Work
center utilization is one of the objectives in manu-
facturing. In terms of work load, this may mean
that, ideally, the amounts of work load should be
constant over all consecutive time periods (within
the current focus). This should hold for all work
centers needed to complete a given new order. The
load-leveling problem is restated in more formal
terms:
The task is
order (pred(L),K,R) > {order (L,W,Rw)
wherefl = <W=<f2 & Ew Rw = R}
by load-leveling where focus (pred (L),K, Ill,
f 2 ] ) , and pred (L) is the predecessor level of level
L (eg. pred (w) = m).

338

For each work center, and each window (L, W) in
focus, predicate: load (Wc, L, W) denotes the
existing load on work center Wc in window (L, W).
Load-Leveling is to compute the Rw such that
load Wc, L, W) + Rw = Newload,.cL.W and
for all l,Ve"
Newloadwc,L,i = Newloadwc,L,j where Y"i=
<i, j = < f 2 .
Another condition is that, for all We, L, i
Newloadwc,L,i = <Maxcapwc,L,i
where Maxcapwc,L,i is the maximal capacity of a
work center Wc in window (L,i). It is in the nature
of the problem that the condition
Newloadwc,L,i = Newloadwc,L,j i:~ j can sel-
dom be achieved.
However, the solution which most clearly
approximates ideal leveling of work loads is
desired. Our heuristic algorithm computes an
acceptable solution in quadratic time. This algo-
rithm is applied repeatedly to each node (window)
in the hierarchy to determine how much of the
quantity requested in the node is to be scheduled in
each of its descendants. Calls to the Load-Leveling
routine on the hierarchy of windows can either be
depth-first or breadth-first. Depth-first calling is
suitable for detailed short-term scheduling, when
the immediate future is of greatest concern. For
long-term scheduling, for the next two quarters,
shallow breadth-first load-leveling is more appro-
priate (minimum horizon planning).
Each work center has a defined maximal capac-
ity. Whenever, as a result of load-leveling, a work
center's maximal capacity is exceeded, backtrack-
ing occurs. Backtracking consists of locally undo-
ing all capacity reservations of the windows which
share the same parent with the conflicting window
and finding an alternative, non-load-leveled, distri-
bution of the parent's work load. If no solution is
found (all allocations would exceed some work
center's maximal capacity) three options are pro-
vided: 1) use capacity reserves (mostly in the f o r m
of additional shifts), or 2) preempt previously
scheduled orders to free needed resources, and 3)
delay if there are slackdays. The choice is made
according to the "priority" of the orders and/or
339
Journal of ,~,lanufczcturing S)'stems
Volume 9/No. 4
management objectives. The latter choice is built
into the model of the system; however, the user has
the option to create a dialogue with the system to
override the system's decision.
Sequencing
Feasibility analysis and detailed scheduling
decide which day a requirement can be realized. But
given a set of requirements for a single day the best
sequence in which to release the orders is decided in
the sequencing phase. The objective of this phase
can be defined by management as one or a combi-
nation of the following: optimizing throughput,
maximizing machine utilization, and minimizing
flow time and work in process (WlP).
The nature of the sequencing algorithm varies,
depending on the type of factory and goals set by
management. ~7z° Sequencing decisions involve
dispatching, which includes routing of orders
through certain work centers and determining the
sequencing of orders at each work center. Analytic
approaches, seeking optimal solutions to the most
sequencing problems of any theoretical or practical
interest, are proven to be computationally infeasi-
ble. Therefore, research in this area has primarily
focused on developing and testing various heuristic
rules operating on the queues of jobs. z~ The rule is
then uniformly applied to all shop queues to choose
the highest priority order to be processed whenever
a work center (or a machine) becomes available.
Example of such rules are; First In First Out (FIFO),
Shortest Processing Time (SPT), Most Number of
Operations Remaining (MNOPR), Earliest Due Date
(EDD) and RANDOM. This extensive research has
failed to arrive at a single simple priority rule which
results in superior performance as measured by all
criteria for all shops and sets of orders. It shows that
one rule may be better than others, depending upon
the measure of performance selected and the char-
acteristics of the shop and orders.
We have developed a novel method called the
Dynamic Sequencing Rule (DSR) to determine an
effective priority rule for the specific scheduling
problem at hand. zz By applying DSR, sequencing
decisions are made in real time to respond to
constantly-changing conditions of manufacturing
environments. Our approach offers a degree of
Journal vf Manu]m'turitL~ Systems
Volume 9/No. 4
flexibility and control that is not available when
other priority rules are employed. The strength of
DSR lies in its ability to take into account, simulta-
neously, various line phenomena, (e.g. setups,
machine breakdowns and downtimes, finite buffers,
blocking and starvation), and management objec-
tives, (e.g. order priority, higher machine utiliza-
tion, lower cycle time and nfinimum tardiness). In
the following subsections, we present the approach
and some experimental results indicating the supe-
riority of DSR to other heuristic rules.
The DSR Approach
As part of a real-time shop-floor control system,
DSR is applied to the queue of the waiting orders.
Based on current conditions, the order with the
highest priority is selected at the time a work center
becomes available. The procedure for computing
priorities is discussed.
Let Pi be the priority value of each order i,
(i= 1..... n) in the queue of the available machine
m , ( m = 1. . . . . M).
Then
Pi = A*BI
B i is an n*l column vector of indexes for some
factors such as: number of remaining operations,
processing time, due date, setup time, type of job
(express or normal), status of the available machine,
state of the next machine for order i (look-ahead),
etc.
and
A is a l*n row vector of weight values for the
indexes specified in B r
The number and kind of indexes included in Bi
depend on the characteristics of the production line.
The weight values in A can be set such that some
objectives are achieved (e.g. speeding up the pro-
cess of the express orders, meeting more due dates,
higher machine utilization). A and B; vectors can be
adjusted to react to both expected and unexpected
changes in the requirements and constraints. Fur-
thermore, this approach can be adapted to any
manufacturing application to generate an effective
and site-dependent sequencing rule. Other implicit
features offered by DSR are:
• In assigning priorities, an important factor is the
status of the available machine or the expected
340
downtime of that machine. Expected downtime
of each machine can be defined as the remaining
time to the end of the work day or to scheduled
maintenance. The weight given to this factor can
ensure the selection of an order such that its
operation can be completed before this event.
This feature is very valuable when systematic
preventive maintenance is a must for reducing
downtime of a costly machine or when unloading
an expensive lot is necessary before the day ends.
If there is not enough time remaining to process
an order, DSR recommends starting maintenance.
The "look-ahead" feature offered by DSR guar-
antees utilization of all machines. The status of
subsequent machines required by the waiting
orders are checked to prevent directing them to
down machines or machines expected to go down
shortly, and to delay sending the orders to the
bottleneck work centers or centers with over-
loaded buffers. Consequently, by encouraging
orders that have their next operations on starving
machines, machine idleness is minimized.
Minimum tardiness is achieved by speeding the
processing of the "rush orders." A rush order is
identified using pre-defined criteria such as, ear-
liest due date, management wish, etc.
Given a penalty (cost) function, P(S) the weight
values in A can be tuned to improve the sched-
ules. Again, it has to be noted that if many factors
contribute to P(S), the problem of optimizing
P(S) is NP-complete.
Finally, daily work plans can be predicted by
applying DSR and using simulation (e.g. using
DSR in the static mode at the beginning of the
day). As a result, dispatch lists containing the
sequence of the orders to load with load and
maintenance times can be provided. This feature
helps the scheduler evaluate the effectiveness of
the schedules and make necessary adjustments, if
possible.
The Use of DSR in a Manufacturing
Environment
Applying DSR in a practical real-time factory
control system requires the utilization of a real-time
data collection and communication system. By
using shop-floor data collection terminals, whether
automated or manually operated, an up-to-date
 Journal of Manufacturing Systems
Volume 9/No. 4

database about the current state of the shop could be generated. The number is sampled from a uniform
maintained. This includes the position of each job in distribution (number of machines + 1,3* number of
the shop, status of each machine, etc. Information machines). Each operation is carried out on one of
about the shop's state is then combined with data the machines and the sequence of operations for
from a short-term planning system "detailed sched- each job is generated randomly. The operation and
uling," to give a complete and accurate picture of maintenance times are sampled from uniform dis-
current shop state and expected job arrivals over the tributions (40,70) and (30,60) respectively. Main-
planning horizon. tenance cycle times are generated from uniform
As a machine becomes available, the data collec- distribution (120,210). It is assumed that preventive
tion system alerts the overall shop controller. The maintenance should start before or at the scheduled
shop controller then consults the database to deter- time to reduce the possibility of machine break-
mine which jobs are in the queue, and applies the down. Jobs are randomly assigned as express or
DSR priority rule to select the next job to be loaded. normal.
Occurrence of events such as machine breakdown, Simulation runs were started with 10 jobs and
job arrivals, and completions cause an interrupt and repeated for 15, 20, 25 . . . . . 100 jobs with DSR,
the appropriate databases are updated. The job FIFO, SPT, MNOPR, and RANDOM for the job-shop
priorities in queue for the next available machine are models with 3, 5, 8, 12, and 17 machines. The
calculated based on the new status of the shop floor. average and standard deviation for the job-flow time
The organization of the process sequencer is (cycle time), job-waiting time, and machine utiliza-
depicted in Figure 5. tion were measured. The behavior of simulated job
shops with 3, 5, 8, 12, and 17 machines were
similar and results from the study with 17 machines
Experimental Results are illustrated in Figures 6-8. The results indicate
A series of" experiments were designed to test the that DSR always produces significantly lower cycle
performance of DSR in a specific job-shop. Simu- times and waiting times than the other four loading
lation was used to compare DSR to other commonly rules, regardless of the number of jobs and/or
used dispatching rules such as; FIFO, SPT, MNOPR, machines. The difference grows as the number of
and RANDOM. In these tests, the number of jobs jobs increase (on the average from 20% to 35%),
and machines were varied (jobs from 10 to 100 and but remains within the same limits as the number of
machines from 3 to 17). To support the results machines increase. The results also demonstrate that
statistically, each test was replicated ten times. DSR outperforms other methods in the average
The job shop simulated for this study may be machine utilization by 15%. The outcome of this
visualized as a network of queues. A queue being
formed in front of each machine in the simulated
shop. It is assumed that all jobs are available at time
zero. For each job a number of operations is

F- lac¢~ .. U'''•'"
G L O B A L D A T A BASES
FACTS '1 11~30 r..,d[" _
MANUFACTURING PROCESS P L A N S & SCHEDULING PLAN
SYSTEMS RESOURCES FROM DETAILED
PARAMETERS DS& ALGORITHM SCHEDULING MODULE
lC~X~ ..4""
O0~ . .E .j.

iooo . "'r','dt • Os~

SYSTEM STATUS
at,o "4 --~-- Rt-o
CURRENT DATA O F JOOS .." - 4 - SJ:'T

J/ \'T'
. " --°* °- PtAN~

...... ....
lo is 20 zs 30 3s 4o 4s so ss Io 6s zo rs Io Is go g$ loo
NO of Jobs

UPDATE FROM N
\1 ........
EACH IDLE MACHINE
I
II C O M M A N D S T O
LOWER LEVEL
THE FACTORY FLOOR

Figure 6
Figure 5 The Effects of Dispatch Rules on the Average Job-
Dynamic Process Sequencer Flow Time (No. of machines= 17)

341
Journal o[" ~4anut~(turin'4 ~ ~tenL~
Volume 9:No. 4

t,=o~o

~ooo ,,=r'"

tz0oo .,r'" ..
.~'" .=r'~ -
1~0oo I. --~" ...,r"~

~oo ,.= • ~ ' ~ ' ..~ - ' ' ' 9 ~

r00o .~.. ....

¢,ooo ,f.-" .... • oSR

~o °"
,4 ...'" "" .... ~ - - - Fro

UNOI~ ~oo ." "" ~ MNOPR

- - -• -- ItANI~M 3OOO

z000

°,o ,', 2'0 2'~ ;0 ,', ,; ,'s so s's ,.0 ,'~ ;o A ,'0 ,', ,~ ,'s ,00 '~,o ,'s 2'0 ~'~ ;o ;s ,'0 ,'~ s'0 5's ;o ,'~ ,'0 A ;0 ,'~ 9.0 ,'5 ,0o
NO of Jobs NO Of Jobs

Figure 7 Figure 8
T h e Effects of Dispatch Rules on the A v e r a g e T h e Effects of Dispatch Rules on the A v e r a g e ,lob-
M a c h i n e Utilization [No. of m a c h i n e s = 17) W a i t i n g T i m e (No. of m a c h i n e s = 17)

study confirms the effectiveness of DSR in main- work center, or b) alerting management about
taining higher machine utilization and reducing the certain quality problems or e.g. a machine that is
cycle and waiting time in the job-shop environments down more than 60% of the time. With the use of
suffering from machine breakdowns. the statistician, ReDS will constantly update its
long-term view of the factory and will try to mold
itself so the specific problems, such as potential
Simulation long-term machine breakdowns, are taken into
account in the scheduling policy. The subject of this
As indicated in the section on the implementation
module is very extensive and beyond the scope of
of REDS, DSR was designed to react to shop floor
this paper. However, where the sequencer monitors
problems in real time. However, users are often
and corrects instances of problems in the shop floor,
interested in looking into the future given a pro-
the statistician is searching for " e p i d e m i c " occur-
posed schedule. The simulation module allows
rences, such as frequent backlog of order, etc.
assumption of future events based on the schedule
that is and would be proposed by REDS. Thus, the
simulation module has two functions: a) "what-if" Conclusions
type questioning, and b) verification of the schedule Classical scheduling theory has been far from
proposed by REDS. The horizon of simulation time successful in solving the practical needs of factory
is specified by the user interactively. It can be done management. Management objectives are often
for the next few minutes, to the next few days, or many, ill-defined, and changing. In general, man-
months. However, our experience indicates that the agement is interested in a decision support tool,
use of simulation to prepare future schedules, espe- facilitating specification of their objectives as they
cially for extended time horizon, is not a particu- change, so that they can react to a constantly
larly reliable approach. This, of course, is due to the changing shop floor, making short and long-term
dynamic nature of most factories. planning decisions. In this paper we described ReDS
which is a dynamic, intelligent, real-time factory
scheduling environment. ReDS combines AI and OR
Statistician techniques for finding solutions that are not always
The statistician is a novel module of REDS; its optimal but acceptable to the changing needs of
function is to monitor, analyze, and correct long- management.
term shop-floor problems. Correction of such prob- ReDS uses a number of different techniques such
lems may occur in two forms: a) signaling different as least commitment planning and abstraction in
modules of ReDS about a newly-found bottleneck order to create a plan. Heuristics are applied from

342

the order and shop floor points of view to optimize
the allocation of resources. ReDS works in real
time, e v e n t - d r i v e n operation, and/or semi-
real-time. The former implies event driven and the
latter time-driven operation. ReDS uses real-time
data for two purposes: short-term feedback to recon-
figure the current schedule and long-term feedback
for adjustment of heuristics. Thus, ReDS can auto-
matically mold itself into the shape of the factory it
serves.
An essential partner for ReDS operation is the
presence of a data collection and equipment moni-
toring system. ReDS is designed to work in a variety
of different environments such as batch manufac-
turing and job-shops. Unlike existing expert sys-
tems, such as ISIS, it deals with the sequencing
problem and addresses the more general scheduling
problem as well. And unlike many other well-
known systems, such as OPIS 13, ReDS is more than
just a paper design or prototype. ReDS has been
operational in one of the most difficult scheduling
environments, namely a VLSI development line, for
over a year and the results are very encouraging.
Other prototypes of ReDS were built for a PCB
assembly line and a plastic connectors assembly
line. The results of our VLSI installation indicate
that ReDS has improved productivity by at least
10%. The actual graphs showing such improve-
ments could not be presented due to the confiden-
tiality of the fab line.
From a more pragmatic viewpoint, an important
question is how to use ReDS with an existing MRP
system. ReDS and MRP can complement each other
since the former's primary task is generation of
real-time schedules, whereas the latter is maintain-
ing a more traditional role of an IMS system. For
example, an MRP system can provide process plan
information and inventory availability data to ReDS
for generating schedules. In addition, the MRP
system can perform other tasks such as accounting,
purchasing, and marketing. In one fab line installa-
tion ReDS is fully integrated with Comets (Trade-
mark of Consilium) for exchange of data and
instructions to the shop floor. The basic configura-
tion is shown in Figure 9, where Comets is used as
a data collection system as well as a manufacturing
database providing engineering information such as
process plans for REDS.
343
Journal o]" Manu]~tcturing Systems
Volume 9-/No. 4
APOLLO
/ ./',.;,:,"/i i ",".,".,".?'-'"~
Figure 9
ReDS/Comets Interface
Acknowledgement
The authors wish to thank Tony Chen, Peter
Spool, Herb Foster, and Rowena Hou for their
invaluable contribution in our frequent discussions
and their many suggestions for improving the
model. The aforementioned individuals as well as
Luc DeRidder and Dietrich Krueger implemented
the system and made it work. John Gaylord was a
constant source of encouragement and support and
helped us generously in order to remove the many
problems we encountered. We thank Karin Cermele
for typing this manuscript and being patient with our
never-ending changes.
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15. K. Hadavi, M.S. Shahraray, "FORCE-Factory Order Release
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DSM. IRes. & Devehqmtent, Vol. 29, No. 4, July, 1985.
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344
Author(s) Biography
Kh~)srow Hada~i received his BSc degree in electronic and
electrical engineering from Birmingham University. UK in 1975:
his MSc in computer engineering from University of Southampton,
UK in 1976: a Master's degree in management from the University
of Birmingham, UK in 1977: and a PhD degree from the Electrical
Engineering Department. University of Michigan in 1983. He is a
group leader of Decision Support Systems Group at Siemens
Corporate Research, Inc.. where he is engaged in research in
various aspects of decision support systems for industrial
management. His current interests are conceptualizing mental
models of factory managers and consultants and automatic updating
of such models directly from the shop floor.
Maryam Shahna~az Shahraray rcccived a BS degree in industrial
engineering from Arya-Mehr University of Technology, Tehran. lran
in 1977; an IrIS degree in industrial and systems engineering from
Ohio University in 1979: and her MS degree in operations research
from the University of Michigan in 19,',12. She is currently a research
scientist with the Decision Support Systems Group at Siemens
Corporate Rescarch, Inc. tter research interests includc real-time
control of flexible manufacturing, automatic explanation of changes in
the results generated by quantitative and qualitative modeling systems.
and application of statistics and opcrations research models and
mcthodologies to industrial decision making problems.
Kerstin Voigt received her undergraduate training in computer
science and psychoh)gy at the University of Frankfort and the
Technical University of Munich, Germany. In 1982 she joined
Rutgers University, NJ. on a two-year Fulbright scholarship. She
received an MSc in computer science in 1984. From 1985 to 1987, she
was employed as a research scientist at Siemens Corporate Research
and Technology, Princeton, NJ. There she was a member of the
Factory Autolnation Group. Since 1987 she has rejoined Rutgcrs
University to pursue a PhD degree in computer science. Her disser-
tation research is on "'incorporating global constraints into hillclimb-
ing patchcrs.'" Her general research interests include automatic
algorithm design, knowledge compilation, constraint incorporation.
and heuristic search.