Model for an Online Examination Timetable using Constraint Programming, PHP and MySQL - Dissertation Example

 Academic institutions all over the world are required to go through the tedious and time-consuming task of producing examination timetables periodically.

Therefore, a universal solution for the examination timetabling problem would have a substantial impact factor. Owing to the fact that different institutes require a solution satisfying different constraints, the problem of finding a generalized solution that caters to all these differences could be rather challenging. Devising a universal model for examination timetable problems would require flexibility in terms of the specified constraints and commercial software cannot provide that. Aims and Objectives The aim of this project would be to suggest a universal framework model for the examination timetabling problem.

A solution that ensures the provision of flexibility in terms of constraint specifications shall be proposed. . Literature includes timetabling systems presented by Hansen and Vidal (1995), Colijn and Layfield (1995), Lim et al (2000), and Dimopoulou and Miliotis (2001). Various approaches have been suggested by researchers and universities to solve the examination timetabling problem. Some survey papers have been published over time listing the techniques that have been utilized in addressing the exam timetabling problems.

These include the survey by Carter and Laporte (1996), Burke and Petrovic (2002), Schaerf (1999), Petrovic and Burke (2004), and Burke et al. (1997). Amongst the approaches include methods based on evolutionary algorithms (Cote 2005), clustering, graph-based sequential methods, case-based reasoning (Gaspero & Schaerf 2001), hyper-heuristics (Burke et al. 2007), harmony search algorithms (Burke et. al 2004), tabu search (Gendreau & Potvin 2005), particle swarm algorithms (Gaspero & Shuref 2001), and simulated annealing (Chiarandini 2006) have been proposed for the examination timetabling problem.

It has been observed that hybrid methods in general give better solutions than pure algorithms. However, efficient integration is required rather than sequentially integrating the different approaches (Que et al. 2006). For building timetabling systems, researchers have used some general constraint programming packages e.g. ECLiPse (Ajili & Wallace 2003). A few efforts have been seen in the literature for standardizing the modeling language and data format (Kingston 2001; Ozcan 2003; Reis & Oliveira 2001) once the need for it was recognized (Burke et al. 1998). Methodology The project has both research and development phases, so time shall be divided accordingly.