Using constraint programming for solving RCPSP/max-cal

Abstract

Resource-constrained project scheduling with the objective of minimizing project duration (RCPSP) is one of the most studied scheduling problems. In this paper we consider the RCPSP with general temporal constraints and calendar constraints. Calendar constraints make some resources unavailable on certain days in the scheduling period and force activity execution to be delayed while resources are unavailable. They arise in practice from, e.g., unavailabilities of staff during public holidays and weekends. The resulting problems are challenging optimization problems. We develop not only six different constraint programming (CP) models to tackle the problem, but also a specialized propagator fo..