SHEDULING

JOB SEQUENCING AND

Scheduling and Control in the Job-Shop

be performed, resources utilizations and

Scheduling is regarded as a time-table for activities to

allocation of facilities. Operation scheduling in job shop disaggregates the master production
schedule into time-phased weekly. daily or hourly activities. That is to say. it specifies precisely
the tems of the planned worked on the productive system in the very short run. On the other

hand, operations control monitors job order progress, and where necessary, expedites orders

and/or adjust system capacity in order to ensure that the master schedule is met. Provision has to

be made for the efficient performance of the following functions when designing a scheduling

and control system:

) Allocation of orders, equipment. and personnel to work centres, as well as. other

specified locations should essentially be short-run capacity planning

i) Establishing job priorities, that is, sequence of order performance

(ii) Dispatching of orders, that is, initiating performance of the scheduled work.
(iV) Shop-floor (production activity) control. This involve:
reviewing status and controlling the progress of orders as they are being worked
on,

expediting orders that are late or critical.

(v) Constant revision of the schedule in the light of changes in order of status.

Elements of the Job-Shop Scheduling Problem

Thesix elements of job-shop scheduling problem are as follow:

Arrival Patterns of Jobs

Jobsmay arrive at the scheduler's desk in a batch or more often over a time
interval according to
some statistical distribution. In the case where jobs arrive in a bateh, it is termed
as 'static'
arrival, while arrival within a time interval is termed 'dynamic' arrival.
Static arrival means that orders are subject to being scheduled at one time and not that the orders
are placed by customers at the same time. T his often occurs when the
production control clerk
 week's
all the previous
job is dispatched until
no new
makes out a schedule a week and
once
dispatched as they arrive and
dynamicarrival. jobs
are

incoming orders are treated. In the

case
of
the production facility.
to reflect their eftect on

the overall schedule updated

Available
Number and Variety of Machines
2
in the shop. The
machines available
affected by the number of
The scheduling process is of machines can be
machine or when a group
is
scheduling problem is made simple if there
one
of
becomes complex as the number and variety
treated as one. However, the scheduling problem
machines increasCs.

Worker to Machine Ratio

3
classified into two as follows:
Worker to machine ratio can be
workers than
system where there are either more
Machine-Limited Systems: This refers to a

workers and machines.

machines or an equal number of

is when there are more machines than workers.

Labour-Limited System: This
studies suggest that
Machine-Limited System has received greater research, though recent

labour-limited systems are more pervasive in practice. The primary areas of concem in studying
determination
labour-limited systems are the utilization of the worker on several machines, and

workers to machines.
of the best way to allocate
Flow Patterns of Jobs through the Shop
4

Theflow pattern of jobs through the shop can be flow shop, randomly routed job shop. or mixed
jobshop. A flow job shop is one where all the jobs follow the same path from one machine to the
next (a good example being a bottling company). A randomly routed job shop is where there is

nosimilar pattern of flow or movement of jobs from one machine to the next. However, there are
jobshops that adapt a method that falls somewhere in between. The extent to which a shop can
beclassified as a flow shop or a randomly routed job shop is determined by the statistical
probability of a job moving from one machine to the next. Such probability is frequently

expressed in a "transitional probability matrix (as obtains in Markov process) which is derived
 next to machine
in machine center i moOving
the percentage of jobs
from the historical data
on

to machine center k, and so on.

centerj, and from machine centerj
center i to center j. 1.0
of 1.0 for a job going from
Apure tlow shop would have a probability would show equal
on: while a randomly routed job shop
from center j to center k, and so

from center i to center, center k, and

so on.
probabilities of a job going

5. Priority Rule for Allocating Jobs

to the criterion used for selecting which job should be started first on some
Prionty rule refers
machine or work center. There is quite a number of rules that are used. These are very simple

rules that require jobs to be sequenced according to a number of intormation, such as processing

several pieces of intormation to

time, due data, or order of arrival. Some other rules may require
ratio" rule. Johnson's rule,
derive an index number, examples are "least slack" rule and "eritical
which can be applied to job scheduling on a sequence of machines, requires a computational

procedureto specify the order of performance. The more commonly used priority rules are listed
below-

FCFS: First-come, First-served. This refers to order or jobs being performed in the order
they arrive in the department.

(i) LCFS: Last-come, First-served. This implies that the order that arrived in the department
last is to be performed first. This is made possible because as orders arrive. they are
placed on top of the stack and the operator uSually picks up the order on top to run first.
LCFS rule can therefore be said to occur by default.

(ii) Random Order Whim: In this case the operators select which-ever job they feel like

running.

(iv) SOT: Shortest operation time. In this case jobs, are processed based on how short it takes
to run them. In other words, orders are run in the inverse order to the time required to

process them in the department. This rule is identical to shortest

rule.
processing time (SPT)
(V) Due Date: Earliest due date first. This
implies that the job with the earliest due date
should be run first. In this case, Due Date is used
when referring to the entire job, while
OPNDD is used when referring to the next
operation.
 time. In this case, the job with the earliest
StartDate: This is due date minus normal lead
(vi)
due date is nun first.
STR
orders with the shortest STR are run
first.
(vil) STR: Slack time remaining. In this case,
and the processing time
is the diference between the time remaining before the due date

remaining. Mathematically.
time remaining
STR=Time remaining before due date- Processing

(Vin) STP/OP: Slack time remaining per operation. Orders with shortest STP/OP are run first.

STP/OP= Time remaining before due date- Remaining.processing time

Number of remaining operations

CR: Critical ratio. This is the difference between the due date and the current date
(ix)
divided by the work remaining. In this case, orders with the smallest CR are run first.

CR Duedate-Current date
Work remaining

(x) QR: Queue ratio. This is obtained by dividing the slack time remaining in the schedule
by the planned remaining queue time. Orders with the smallest QR are run first.
Queue Ratio
Slacktime remaining in the schedule
Planned remaining queue time
6. Schedule evaluation criteria

Thefollowing are the standard measures of schedule performance that are used to evaluate the
priority rules.

Mecting due dates of customers

i) Minimizing the time a job spends in the shop (flow time)
(ii) Minimizing work-in-process (WIP)
(iv) Minimizing the idle time of machines and workers.
Priority Rules and Techniques in 1,2 and N Machine Job Shops

Scheduling m Jobs on One Machine

7,5,8,9, respectively. to be
Suppose there are four jobs A, B, C, D with processing time (in days)
on one machine. This is referred to as m jobs - one machine problem.Furthermore,
processed
perfomance
the of two of
assumethat the order of arrival of the jobs is A. B, C, D. We shall
test

be minimum flow time.

thelisted rules in scheduling the jobs; the evaluation criterion will
FCFS Schedule

Joborder of arrival Time(dayS) Flow Timeof Job

A 0+7-7

7 +5 12

C 12+8 20

D 20+9 29
Total flow time 68days

Mean flow time-= 17days

SOT Schedule

Job Time (days) Flow Time of Job

B 0+5-5

5+7-12

12+9-29
66days
Mean
fow time- =
16
Of the two rules tested, SOT has a better result, and this has been proved to be always the case.

Runout Method of Scheduling n Jobs on One Machine

 runs for a group of jobs that share the same

method is used to determine the production

This scheduled
of time for which previously
facilities. The runout time is the period
production
the inventory on hand, will satisty demands for an
item.
production when added to

hours) that the

production capacity (machine
so

utilization of
Themethod aims at balancing the the
efforts to be balanced across

for all items is the same. This allows production

runout time
concentrated on a few items.
group of items rather than being
of 108 hours per
machine with availability capacity
Consider the scheduling of six items on a

on hand, forecast
required information on the six item (production time, inventory
week. The to caleulate
in the table below. We intend to use the runout method
weekiy usage) are as given
runout time for the items and the production schedule.
the common

Scheduling n Jobs on Two Machines

the n jobs-2 machine flow-shop case. In this case, two or

more jobs are
Thisis referred to as

of problem, Johnson's
to be on two machines in a common sequence. For this class
processed
optimal solution. The steps involved
method which consists of certain procedure, can provide an

follows:
in Johnson's method are as

List the jobs and the operation time for each job on both machines.

2 Select the job with the shortest operation time.

If the shortest operation time is for the first machine, do the job first; if it is for the second
3
machine, do the job last.

4 Repeat steps 2 and 3 for each remaining job until the schedule iscomplete.

Consider the scheduling of four jobs on two machines with the respective operation time on each

machine as stated below.

Job Operation Time on Machine 1 Operation Time on Machine2

D
 job A
2 and 3 of Johnson's method, select shortest operation time and
assign. Since
Using steps and it should be
time on machine 2. it is the first to be assigned
has the shortest operation
performed last.

shortest on
be assigned, job D is the second
Repeating steps 2 and 3 for the remaining jobs to

second to the last job (i.e. job

and be performed
machine 2, thus it is the second to be assigned
to

hence it is assigned next to be performed

machine 1 than job C,
A).Job B has a shorter time on

the two machines is BCDA.

the four jobs on
firston machine 1. Thus, the order of perfoming
Johnson's method can also yield an optimal solution
for njobs-3 machine cases.
Scheduling n Jobs on m Machine

machine centers that

This is the most complex job shops scheduling characterized by multiple
the centers throughout the
intermittent arrival at
process a variety of different kind of jobs with
be processed through m machines, and all jobs are to be processed
day. When we have n jobs to

of the
on all the machines, the jobs would have to be scheduled on the machine by using some

A good example is:

priority rules.

job Sequence & time Total timeDue Date

A(6). C(4). B(4) 14 17

A(S). (B5), c2) 12 15

B(2). C6) 8 11

B(3).A(3),. C3) 11
C5), B(4) 3

C(2). A(4),B2) 10
NOTE No interruption

Sequcnce must be followed

This is a typical question on njobs to be processed through multiple machines. The interpretation
is that there 6 jobs to be processed on 3 machines (A.B &C). JOB 1 will be process on machine
A for 6 period of time, before process on machine C for 4 period of time and then on machine B

for 4 period of time. Job 2 will be process on machine A. B & C for the period 5,5,2 respectively.
ditto to the remaining jobs. The instruction below the table requiring no interruption simply
means that each of the jobs should be allowed to complete its being processed on the machine
 for example job 1 must
wichout stoppage. While the "sequence
should befollowed means
that:
machine C and A that onder.
in Also
machine A, before being on
process
first be processed on machine B and C in that

processed on machine A. before being process on

Job 2 must firnst be

machine B, before being
process machine C.
on

order. Job 3 must first be processed on