 In flow shop we may have n jobs each requiring

m tasks T1i, T2i, …., Tmi, 1≤i≤n, to be

performed.
 Task Tji is to be performed on processor Pj,
1≤j≤m.
 The time required to complete task Tji is tji.
 A schedule for the n jobs is an assignment of
tasks to time intervals on the processors.
 Task Tji must be assigned to processor Pj.
 No processor may have more than one task
assigned to it in any time interval.
 For any job i the processing of task Tij, j>1,
cannot be started until task T j-1,i has been
completed.
 A nonpreemptive schedule
 Preeptive schedule

 The finish time f (S) of job i is the time at

i
which all tasks of job i have been completed
in schedule S.
 The finish time F(S) of a schedule S is given

by
F(S) = max 1≤i≤n{fi(S)}
The mean flow time MFT(S) is defined to be


MFT(S) = 1/n∑1≤i≤nfi(S)
 An optimal permutation(schedule) has the
property that given the first job in the
permutation, the remaining permutation is
optimal.
 Let σ1, σ2, …, σk be a permutation prefix
defining a schedule for jobs T1, T2, …., Tk.
 We obtain a schedule with this property by
making the following observations
 If min{a1, a2, …, an, b1, b2, …, bn} is ai, then job
i should be the first job in an optimal
schedule
 If min{a1, a2, …, an, b1, b2, …, bn} is bj, then job
j should be the last job in an optimal schedule
 This enables to make a decision as to the
positioning of one of the n jobs.
 The scheduling rule is

1. Sort all the ai’s and bj’s into nondecreasing

order
2. Consider this sequence in this order, if the
next number in the sequence is aj and job j
hasn’t yet been scheduled, schedule job j at
the leftmost available spot. If the next
number is bj and job j hasn’t yet been
scheduled, schedule job j at the rightmost
available spot. If j has already been
scheduled, go to the next number in the
sequence.