CVS 486

Lecture 1
 INTRODUCTION
 Definition: Operations research (OR) may be described as a
scientific approach to decision making that involves the
operations of organizational systems.
 (OR) has the following outstanding characteristics:
 As its name implies, OR involves ‘research on operations’ It is applied
to problems that concern how to conduct and coordinate the operations
or activities within an organization.
 It adopts an organizational point of view and attempts to resolve the
conflicts of interest among the components of the organization in a way
that is best for the organization as a whole.
 It attempts to find the best or optimal solution to the problem under
consideration.
INTRODUCTION
 It uses a team approach. It requires a group of individuals having
diverse backgrounds and skills.
In summary OR is concerned with optimal decision making in, and
modelling of, deterministic and probabilistic systems that originate
from real life.

Its applications are largely characterised by the need to allocate

limited resources.
Origin of Operations Research
 The first formal activities of OR were initiated in England during
World War II when a team of British scientists set out to make
decisions regarding the best utilization of war material.
 Following the end of the war, the ideas advanced in military
operations were adapted to improve efficiency and productivity in
the civilian sector.
 By 1951, OR had already taken hold in Great Britain and then
spread to the U.S.
Applications of Operations Research
 Military services – OR approach is applied to problems of national
defence.
 Business and Industry – it has been used successively in the
solution of problems concerned with:
 assignment of personnel,
 blending of materials,
 distribution and transportation,
 investment portfolios,
 planning advertising expenditures,
 distributing sales effort,
 production scheduling,
 traffic congestion, servicing machines subject to breakdown,
determining the level of service of a service force, air traffic
scheduling, design of dams, inventory theory and hospital operation.
Operations Research Models
A model can be defined as a representation of a system that
allows for investigation of the properties of the system and, in
some cases, prediction of future outcomes.

3 Components of a decision-making Problem

 The decision alternatives: decision variables
 Restrictions under which the decision is made.
 Construction of objective fns & constraints of the model.
 An appropriate objective criterion for evaluating the
alternatives.
A solution of the model is feasible if it satisfies all the
constraints.
Operations Research Models
OR model is usually organised in the following general
format:
Maximise or Minimise objective
function
Subject to
Constraints

 A solution of the model is feasible if it satisfies all the

constraints.
 It is optimal if, in addition to being feasible, it yields the
best (maximum or minimum) value of the objective
function.
Operations Research Models
Note that OR models are designed to ‘optimise’ a specific
objective criterion subject to a set of constraints, the quality
of the resulting solution depends on the accuracy of the
model in representing the real system.

If the model happens to represent the system reasonably well,

then its solution is optimum also for the real situation.
Phases of an Operations Research Study
The principal phases for implementing OR in
practice include:

1. Definition of the problem

 Description of the decision alternatives,
 Determination of the objective of the study, and
 Specification of the limitations under which the modelled system operates .

2. Construction of the model

3. Solution of the model
4. Validation of the model
5. Implementation of the solution
Mathematical Methods of Operations Research
Operations research techniques include the following:
 Linear programming – this is the most prominent OR technique. It
is designed for models in which objective and constraint functions
are strictly linear.
 Integer programming – in which the variables assume integer
values.
 Dynamic programming – in which the original model can be
decomposed into smaller sub-problems.
 Network programming – in which the problem can be modelled as
a network.
 Nonlinear programming – in which the functions of the model are
nonlinear.
 Solutions in OR are determined by algorithms. An
algorithm provides fixed computational rules that are
applied repetitively to the problem with each repetition
(called iteration) moving the solution closer to the
optimum.
 When Mathematical Models are complex to solve -> no.
optimal solution > simply seek a good solution using
heuristic or rules of thumb.