We study the problem of scheduling $n$ independent moldable tasks on $m$ processors that arises in large-scale parallel computations. When tasks are monotonic, the best known result is a $(\frac{3}{2}+ε)$-approximation algorithm for makespan minimization with a complexity linear in $n$ and polynomial in $\log{m}$ and $\frac{1}ε$ where $ε$ is arbitrarily small. We propose a new perspective of the existing speedup models: the speedup of a task $T_{j}$ is linear when the number $p$ of assigned processors is small (up to a threshold $δ_{j}$) while it presents monotonicity when $p$ ranges in $[δ_{j}, k_{j}]$; the bound $k_{j}$ indicates an unacceptable overhead when parallelizing on too many processors. The generality of this model is proved to be between the classic monotonic and linear-speedup models. For any given integer $δ\geq 5$, let $u=\left\lceil \sqrt[2]δ \right\rceil-1\geq 2$. In this paper, we propose a $\frac{1}{θ(δ)} (1+ε)$-approximation algorithm for makespan minimization where $θ(δ) = \frac{u+1}{u+2}\left( 1- \frac{k}{m} \right)$ ($m\gg k$). As a by-product, we also propose a $θ(δ)$-approximation algorithm for throughput maximization with a common deadline.
A moldable job is a job that can be executed on an arbitrary number of processors, and whose processing time depends on the number of processors allotted to it. A moldable job is monotone if its work doesn't decrease for an increasing number of allotted processors. We consider the problem of scheduling monotone moldable jobs to minimize the makespan. We argue that for certain compact input encodings a polynomial algorithm has a running time polynomial in n and log(m), where n is the number of jobs and m is the number of machines. We describe how monotony of jobs can be used to counteract the i…
The scheduling literature has traditionally focused on a single type of resource (e.g., computing nodes). However, scientific applications in modern High-Performance Computing (HPC) systems process large amounts of data, hence have diverse requirements on different types of resources (e.g., cores, cache, memory, I/O). All of these resources could potentially be exploited by the runtime scheduler to improve the application performance. In this paper, we study multi-resource scheduling to minimize the makespan of computational workflows comprised of parallel jobs subject to precedence constraint…
In the moldable job scheduling problem one has to assign a set of $n$ jobs to $m$ machines, in order to minimize the time it takes to process all jobs. Each job is moldable, so it can be assigned not only to one but any number of the equal machines. We assume that the work of each job is monotone and that jobs can be placed non-contiguously. In this work we present a $(\frac 3 2 + ε)$-approximation algorithm with a worst-case runtime of ${O(n \log^2(\frac 1 ε+ \frac {\log (εm)} ε) + \frac{n}ε \log(\frac 1 ε) {\log (εm)})}$ when $m\le 16n$. This is an improvement over the best known algorithm o…
A new evolutionary algorithm for scheduling and allocation algorithm is developed for an elliptic filter. The elliptic filter is scheduled and allocated in the proposed work which is then compared with the different scheduling algorithms like As Soon As Possible algorithm, As Late As Possible algorithm, Mobility Based Shift algorithm, FDLS, FDS and MOGS. In this paper execution time and resource utilization is calculated using different scheduling algorithm for an Elliptic Filter and reported that proposed Scheduling and Allocation increases the speed of operation by reducing the control step.…
We introduce the Scheduling.jl Julia package, which is intended for collaboratively conducting scheduling research and for sharing implementations of algorithms. It provides the fundamental building blocks for implementing scheduling algorithms following the three-field notation of Graham et al., i.e., it has functionality to describe machine environments, job characteristics, and optimality criteria. Our goal is to foster algorithm and code sharing in the scheduling community. Scheduling.jl can also be used to support teaching scheduling theory in classes. We will show the main functionalitie…
This paper presents a new algorithm based on integrating Genetic Algorithms and Tabu Search methods to solve the Job Shop Scheduling problem. The idea of the proposed algorithm is derived from Genetic Algorithms. Most of the scheduling problems require either exponential time or space to generate an optimal answer. Job Shop scheduling (JSS) is the general scheduling problem and it is a NP-complete problem, but it is difficult to find the optimal solution. This paper applies Genetic Algorithms and Tabu Search for Job Shop Scheduling problem and compares the results obtained by each. With the im…
In this paper, we design the first streaming algorithms for the problem of multitasking scheduling on parallel machines with shared processing. In one pass, our streaming approximation schemes can provide an approximate value of the optimal makespan. If the jobs can be read in two passes, the algorithm can find the schedule with the approximate value. This work not only provides an algorithmic big data solution for the studied problem, but also gives an insight into the design of streaming algorithms for other problems in the area of scheduling.
We introduce and study a general scheduling problem that we term the Packing Scheduling problem. In this problem, jobs can have different arrival times and sizes; a scheduler can process job $j$ at rate $x_j$, subject to arbitrary packing constraints over the set of rates ($\vec{x}$) of the outstanding jobs. The PSP framework captures a variety of scheduling problems, including the classical problems of unrelated machines scheduling, broadcast scheduling, and scheduling jobs of different parallelizability. It also captures scheduling constraints arising in diverse modern environments ranging f…
Fixed-parameter tractability analysis and scheduling are two core domains of combinatorial optimization which led to deep understanding of many important algorithmic questions. However, even though fixed-parameter algorithms are appealing for many reasons, no such algorithms are known for many fundamental scheduling problems. In this paper we present the first fixed-parameter algorithms for classical scheduling problems such as makespan minimization, scheduling with job-dependent cost functions-one important example being weighted flow time-and scheduling with rejection. To this end, we identi…
We consider the problem of scheduling jobs with equal lengths on uniform parallel batch machines with non-identical capacities where each job can only be processed on a specified subset of machines called its processing set. For the case of equal release times, we give efficient exact algorithms for various objective functions. For the case of unequal release times, we give efficient exact algorithms for minimizing makespan.
In this paper we consider several constrained activity scheduling problems in the time and space domains, like finding activity orderings which optimize the values of several objective functions (time scheduling) or finding optimal locations where certain types of activities will take place (space scheduling). We present novel, efficient algorithmic solutions for all the considered problems, based on the dynamic programming and greedy techniques. In each case we compute exact, optimal solutions.
Motivated by the current research in data centers and cloud computing, we study the problem of scheduling a set of two-stage jobs on multiple two-stage flowshops. A new formulation for configurations of such scheduling is proposed, which leads directly to improvements to the complexity of scheduling algorithms for the problem. Motivated by the observation that the costs of the two stages can be significantly different, we present deeper study on the structures of the problem that leads to a new approach to designing scheduling algorithms for the problem. With more thorough analysis, we show th…
Online scheduling in identical machines with makespan minimization has been a well studied research problem in the literature. In online scheduling, the scheduler receives a list of jobs one by one and assigns each incoming job on the fly irrevocably to one of the machines before the arrival of the next job. In this paper, we study a variant of the online scheduling problem, where jobs are requested on the fly from k distinct sources. On simultaneous arrival of jobs from multiple sources, it is a non-trivial research challenge to ensure fairness in scheduling with respect to distinct sources, …
We consider several combinatorial optimization problems which combine the classic shop scheduling problems, namely open shop scheduling or job shop scheduling, and the shortest path problem. The objective of the obtained problem is to select a subset of jobs that forms a feasible solution of the shortest path problem, and to execute the selected jobs on the open (or job) shop machines to minimize the makespan. We show that these problems are NP-hard even if the number of machines is two, and cannot be approximated within a factor less than 2 if the number of machines is an input unless P=NP. W…
We propose an efficient branch-and-cut algorithm to exactly solve the parallel drone scheduling traveling salesman problem. Our algorithm can find optimal solutions for all but two existing instances with up to 229 customers in a reasonable running time. To make the problem more challenging for future methods, we introduce two new sets of 120 larger instances with the number of customers varying from 318 to 783 and test our algorithm and investigate the performance of state-of-the-art metaheuristics on these instances.
The Multiprocessor Scheduling Problem (MSP) is an NP-Complete problem with significant applications in computer and operations systems. We provide a survey of the wide array of polynomial-time approximation, heuristic, and meta-heuristic based algorithms that exist for solving MSP. We also implement Fujita's state-of-the-art Branch-and-Bound algorithm and evaluate the benefit of using Fujita's binary search bounding method instead of the Fernandez bound. We find that in fact Fujita's method does not offer any improvement over the Fernandez bound on our data set.
We consider a natural generalization of classical scheduling problems in which using a time unit for processing a job causes some time-dependent cost which must be paid in addition to the standard scheduling cost. We study the scheduling objectives of minimizing the makespan and the sum of (weighted) completion times. It is not difficult to derive a polynomial-time algorithm for preemptive scheduling to minimize the makespan on unrelated machines. The problem of minimizing the total (weighted) completion time is considerably harder, even on a single machine. We present a polynomial-time algori…
We investigate dynamic algorithms for the interval scheduling problem. Our algorithm runs in amortised time $O(\log n)$ for query operation and $O(d\log^2 n)$ for insertion and removal operations, where $n$ and $d$ are the maximal numbers of intervals and pairwise overlapping intervals respectively. We also show that for a monotonic set, that is when no interval properly contains another interval, the amortised complexity is $O(\log n)$ for both query and update operations. We compare the two algorithms for the monotonic interval sets using experiments.
In 2005 Li et al. gave a phi-competitive deterministic online algorithm for scheduling of packets with agreeable deadlines with a very interesting analysis. This is known to be optimal due to a lower bound by Hajek. We claim that the algorithm by Li et al. can be slightly simplified, while retaining its competitive ratio. Then we introduce randomness to the modified algorithm and argue that the competitive ratio against oblivious adversary is at most 4/3. Note that this still leaves a gap between the best known lower bound of 5/4 by Chin et al. for randomised algorithms against oblivious adver…
This paper deals with the problem of preventive maintenance (PM) scheduling of pipelines subject to external corrosion defects. The preventive maintenance strategy involves an inspection step at some epoch, together with a repair schedule. This paper proposes to determine the repair schedule as well as an inspection time minimizing the maintenance cost. This problem is formulated as a binary integer non-linear programming model and we approach it under a decision support framework. We derive a polynomial-time algorithm that computes the optimum PM schedule and suggests different PM strategies …
Efficient Approximation Algorithms for Scheduling Coflows with Precedence Constraints in Identical Parallel Networks to Minimize Weighted Completion Time
Online algorithm has been an emerging area of interest for researchers in various domains of computer science. The online $m$-machine list scheduling problem introduced by Graham has gained theoretical as well as practical significance in the development of competitive analysis as a performance measure for online algorithms. In this paper, we study and explore the performance of Graham's online \textit{list scheduling algorithm(LSA)} for independent jobs. In the literature, \textit{LSA} has already been proved to be $2-\frac{1}{m}$ competitive, where $m$ is the number of machines. We present t…
We study the online preemptive scheduling of intervals and jobs (with restarts). Each interval or job has an arrival time, a deadline, a length and a weight. The objective is to maximize the total weight of completed intervals or jobs. While the deterministic case for intervals was settled a long time ago, the randomized case remains open. In this paper we first give a 2-competitive randomized algorithm for the case of equal length intervals. The algorithm is barely random in the sense that it randomly chooses between two deterministic algorithms at the beginning and then sticks with it therea…
In online scheduling, jobs are available one by one and each job must be scheduled irrevocably before the availability of the next job. Semi-online scheduling is a relaxed variant of online scheduling, where an additional memory in terms of buffer or an Extra Piece of Information(EPI) is provided along with input data. The EPI may include one or more of the parameter(s) such as size of the largest job, total size of all jobs, arrival sequence of the jobs, optimum makespan value or range of job's processing time. A semi-online scheduling algorithm was first introduced in 1997 by Kellerer et al.…
The coordination among drones and ground vehicles for last-mile delivery has gained significant interest in recent years. In this paper, we study \textit{multiple drone delivery scheduling problem(MDSP) \cite{Betti_ICDCN22} for last-mile delivery, where we have a set of drones with an identical battery budget and a set of delivery locations, along with reward or profit for delivery, cost and delivery time intervals. The objective of the MDSP is to find a collection of conflict-free schedules for each drone such that the total profit for delivery is maximum subject to the battery constraint of …
This paper studies a single-machine scheduling problem with a non-renewable resource (NR-SSP) and total weighted completion time criterion. The non-renewable resource is consumed when the machine starts processing a job. We consider the case where each job's weight in the objective function is proportional to its resource consumption amount. The problem is known to be NP-hard in this case. We propose a 3-approximation list scheduling algorithm for this problem. Besides, we show that the approximation ratio 3 is tight for the algorithm.
We consider single-machine scheduling problems that are natural generalizations or variations of the min-sum set cover problem and the min-sum vertex cover problem. For each of these problems, we give new approximation algorithms. Some of these algorithms rely on time-indexed LP relaxations. We show how a variant of alpha-point scheduling leads to the best-known approximation ratios, including a guarantee of 4 for an interesting special case of the so-called generalized min-sum set cover problem. We also make explicit the connection between the greedy algorithm for min-sum set cover and the co…
The problem of attaining energy efficiency in distributed systems is of importance, but a general, non-domain-specific theory of energy-minimal scheduling is far from developed. In this paper, we classify the problems of energy-minimal scheduling and present theoretical foundations of the same. We derive results concerning energy-minimal scheduling of independent jobs in a distributed system with functionally similar machines with different working and idle power ratings. The machines considered in our system can have identical as well as different speeds. If the jobs can be divided into arbit…
In the federated scheduling approaches in multiprocessor systems, a task either 1) is restricted to execute sequentially on a single processor or 2) has exclusive access to the assigned processors. There have been several positive results to conduct good federated scheduling policies, which have constant speedup factors with respect to any optimal federated scheduling algorithm. This paper answers an open question: "For constrained-deadline task systems with directed acyclic graph (DAG) dependency structures, do federated scheduling policies have a constant speedup factor with respect to any o…
Modern data centers face new scheduling challenges in optimizing job-level performance objectives, where a significant challenge is the scheduling of highly parallel data flows with a common performance goal (e.g., the shuffle operations in MapReduce applications). Chowdhury and Stoica introduced the coflow abstraction to capture these parallel communication patterns, and Chowdhury et al. proposed effective heuristics to schedule coflows efficiently. In our previous paper, we considered the strongly NP-hard problem of minimizing the total weighted completion time of coflows with release dates,…
This paper discussed some job scheduling algorithms for Hadoop platform, and proposed a jobs scheduling optimization algorithm based on Bayes Classification viewing the shortcoming of those algorithms which are used. The proposed algorithm can be summarized as follows. In the scheduling algorithm based on Bayes Classification, the jobs in job queue will be classified into bad job and good job by Bayes Classification, when JobTracker gets task request, it will select a good job from job queue, and select tasks from good job to allocate JobTracker, then the execution result will feedback to the …
In this paper, we design an efficient algorithm for the energy-aware profit maximizing scheduling problem, where the high performance computing system administrator is to maximize the profit per unit time. The running time of the proposed algorithm is depending on the number of task types, while the running time of the previous algorithm is depending on the number of tasks. Moreover, we prove that the worst-case performance ratio is close to 2, which maybe the best result. Simulation experiments show that the proposed algorithm is more accurate than the previous method.
Evolutionary algorithms have been frequently used for dynamic optimization problems. With this paper, we contribute to the theoretical understanding of this research area. We present the first computational complexity analysis of evolutionary algorithms for a dynamic variant of a classical combinatorial optimization problem, namely makespan scheduling. We study the model of a strong adversary which is allowed to change one job at regular intervals. Furthermore, we investigate the setting of random changes. Our results show that randomized local search and a simple evolutionary algorithm are ve…
We consider the problem of scheduling a set of $n$ tasks on $m$ processors under precedence, communication, and global system energy constraints to minimize makespan. We extend existing scheduling models to account for energy usage and give convex programming algorithms that yield essentially the same results as existing algorithms that do not consider energy, while adhering to a strict energy bound.
In this paper, the single machine scheduling problem with deteriorating jobs and learning effects are considered, which is shown in the previous research that the SDR method no longer provides an optimal solution for the problem. In order to solve the problem, a new exact algorithm is proposed. Various test problems are solved to evaluate the performance of the proposed heuristic algorithm using different measures. The results indicate that the algorithm can solve various test problems with small, medium and large sizes in a few seconds with an error around 1% where solving the test problems w…
Due to the ubiquity of batch data processing in cloud computing, the related problem of scheduling malleable batch tasks and its extensions have received significant attention recently. In this paper, we consider a fundamental model where a set of n tasks is to be processed on C identical machines and each task is specified by a value, a workload, a deadline and a parallelism bound. Within the parallelism bound, the number of machines assigned to a task can vary over time without affecting its workload. For this model, we obtain two core results: a sufficient and necessary condition such that …
Machine scheduling problems are a long-time key domain of algorithms and complexity research. A novel approach to machine scheduling problems are fixed-parameter algorithms. To stimulate this thriving research direction, we propose 15 open questions in this area whose resolution we expect to lead to the discovery of new approaches and techniques both in scheduling and parameterized complexity theory.
Reconfigurable optical topologies are emerging as a promising technology to improve the efficiency of datacenter networks. This paper considers the problem of scheduling opportunistic links in such reconfigurable datacenters. We study the online setting and aim to minimize flow completion times. The problem is a two-tier generalization of classic switch scheduling problems. We present a stable-matching algorithm which is $2\cdot (2/\varepsilon+1)$-competitive against an optimal offline algorithm, in a resource augmentation model: the online algorithm runs $2+\varepsilon$ times faster. Our algo…
Coffman and Sethi proposed a heuristic algorithm, called LD, for multi-processor scheduling, to minimize makespan over flowtime-optimal schedules. LD algorithm is a natural extension of a very well-known list scheduling algorithm, Longest Processing Time (LPT) list scheduling, to our bicriteria scheduling problem. Moreover, in 1976, Coffman and Sethi conjectured that LD algorithm has precisely the following worst-case performance bound: $\frac{5}{4} - \frac{3}{4(4m-1)}$, where m is the number of machines. In this paper, utilizing some recent work by the authors and Huang, from 2013, which expo…