Meta-RaPS approach for solving the resource allocation problem

Project scheduling is an important planning function that involves scheduling activities of a project such that the total completion time for the entire project is minimized. In performing this function, one is often faced with the problem of limited resources in addition to considering the time element and precedence constraints of the project. The task of allocation of limited resources to competing activities further complicates the project scheduling procedure. Because of the fact that the Resource Allocation Problem is a very known and well-studied combinatorial problem, a number of heuristic rules can be found in literature. In this paper, authors present a new approach, Meta-RaPS (metaheuristic for randomized priority search), to address this combinatorial problem. This article will show experimental results using the Meta-RaPS approach on several well-known resource constrained project scheduling problem test sets.