Enhanced Priority Rule Synthesis with Waiting Conditions

This work concerns the automated synthesis of priority rules for schedule optimization. Metaheuristic optimizers, in particular genetic programming (GP), are applied to develop the rule system for several scheduling situations in manufacturing scenarios. In this work, the rules are enhanced with a "no work" decision that leaves the deciding entity in a waiting state. Through simulation experiments it is shown how this enables the rule system to achieve a wider range of solutions.