A holonic approach to dynamic manufacturing scheduling

Abstract

Manufacturing scheduling is a comp1ex combinatorial problem, particularly in distributed and dynamic environments. This paper presents a holonic approach to manufacturing scheduling, which in opposite to traditional approaches, distributes the scheduling functions over several entities, combining their calculation power and local optimization. In this scheduling and control approach, the scheduling mechanism evolves dynamically to combine optimized scheduling, achieved by central entities, and distributed scheduling, improving its responsiveness and robustness. © 2006 International Federation for Information Processing.