Please help with room allocation

[fetko]

We have been testing your timetable software at our school for some time now. We have been pleased so far; however, one major problem has arisen.

We defined 6 rooms and 6 subjects (ECO221 to ECO226).

We defined activity tags for each activity (pred or vjez).

We also defined subgroups which are used to create final output.

The following is our problem:

We defined the following constraints (a subject+activity tag have a set of preferred rooms). Attached is the screenshot for those constraints.

When we generate our schedule, the software does not allocate some subjects to rooms.  For example, we have ECO226 that is apparently planned for Thursdays from 16:00 to 18:00 but ECO226 does not have a room even though we have listed the following constraint: subject tag preffered rooms, WP:95%, S:ECO226AT:vjez, R:PDS1, R:PDS2, R:PDS3. Provided is our sample output.

Attached is also our fet file.

Please let us know if you can help us. We would appreciate your help very much so.

Regards,

[Liviu Lalescu]

Please use 100% weight. Why did you use 95%? 100% means satisfied all the time, 95% means in some cases constraints are not respected.

[fetko]

Thank you very much!  It works now.

We will be posting about our progress on this forum.

[catalin]

Hi,

I have almost the same problem, but I've specified IP 100%.

As activities I have defined only 3 courses but they do not get allocated rooms.

I've specified constrains only for some subjects which are not defined yet as activities...

Why these 3 courses/defined activities do not get rooms?
Thank you,
Catalin

[Volker Dirr]

Because your space constraints use activity tag "laboratory", but your activities have activity tag "course".

so there are 2 solutions:
a) change activity tag "laboratory" to "course" in the space constraints
or
b) also add (or change) activity tag "laboratory" to the activities.

(just the variant that is best for your dataset)

[catalin]

So I should understand that each activity has to have space constraints?

In my case I do not care where (building/room) the courses would be allocated - that is why I did not allocate a space constraint for them; but I do care about the laboratories (for which I've defined space constraints)

Catalin

[Volker Dirr]

please check your sampleset. you added 3 times the same space constraint.
you have only activities with activity tag "course", but you don't have a space constraint with activity "course". that is why no room is used.

if you don't have room problems to your courses, then you don't need to add a space constarint at all.
if you have room problems, then of course you need to add space constraints.

schools normaly have home rooms to students or teachers. i am not sure about (your) university.
of course you shouldn't add a constraint to every single activity. that is normaly much to much work.

so schools normaly use only teacher or students home rooms and subject space constraint.

i saw your datafile contain many subjects.
so i guess you maybe need an other feature.

how did you "select" the room in the last timetable? i guess you have room problems and just took a room that is free without any priority?

so you need a "default room(s) space constraint"? Similar to "home room constraint", just for all activities that doesn't have a space constraint (and not only to activities of special teachers or students).
or maybe an option in the settings that is called "every avtivitiy must get a room".

currently that is not implemented, because most schools i know have home rooms to students/classes and every class have an own room. so that schools schedule without caring about (home) rooms, because they will never have a problem.

let us wait for Livius answer. i guess he will implement one of that ideas.

[catalin]

>>please check your sampleset. you added 3 times the same space constraint.
OK. Solved.
>>you have only activities with activity tag "course", but you don't have a space constraint with activity "course". that is why no room is used.
That is why I have suggested the addition of "Tag+Space constraints" at http://lalescu.ro/liviu/fet/forum/index.php?topic=620.0, because I wanted the "courses" to go in certain locations like big rooms/amphitheaters and no in any room...

>>if you don't have room problems to your courses, then you don't need to add a space constarint at all.
>>if you have room problems, then of course you need to add space constraints.

>>schools normaly have home rooms to students or teachers. i am not sure about (your) university.
>>of course you shouldn't add a constraint to every single activity. that is normaly much to much work.

>>so schools normaly use only teacher or students home rooms and subject space constraint.

>>i saw your datafile contain many subjects.
>>so i guess you maybe need an other feature.

>>how did you "select" the room in the last timetable? i guess you have room problems and just took a room that is free without any priority?
YES. That's it...
we have rooms for seminaries, for labs (with computers) and amphitheaters. Each room has a certain capacity (and I've seen that FET supports this). In FET we could use the "activity tags" to specify courses/seminaries/labs and each activity would take place in rooms specific for each activity. Because at a "course" participate many students we could define rooms for "courses" using a "Tag+Space constraint" and so on.

I think that, exepting the capacity for each rooms, this is our most important space constraint. Otherwise it does not matter is course C1 takes place in room A1 or A2 as soon as it has the capacity...

>>so you need a "default room(s) space constraint"? Similar to "home room constraint", just for all activities that doesn't have a space >>constraint (and not only to activities of special teachers or students).
>>or maybe an option in the settings that is called "every avtivitiy must get a room".
Of course that this is important. At last, it does not matter if seminar S1 takes place in a big room/amphiteater as soon as it get a room.

Ordering the priorites:
1. "Tag+Space constraints" (e.g.:activities tag as courses go to their rooms, the same for labs)
2. "every activitiy must get a room" (as above: for seminars and other activities)

>>currently that is not implemented, because most schools i know have home rooms to students/classes and every class have an own room. so that >>schools schedule without caring about (home) rooms, because they will never have a problem.

>>let us wait for Livius answer. i guess he will implement one of that ideas.

[catalin]

Hi,

I have a new set where I've specified students, teachers, rooms and activities without any tags

Space Constraints: none

Still FET does not fill in rooms in the allocated timetable

[Liviu Lalescu]

Hi,

I have a new set where I've specified students, teachers, rooms and activities without any tags

Space Constraints: none

Still FET does not fill in rooms in the allocated timetable

Of course, because you need to define space constraints for that.

[catalin]

But I do not want any space constraint. I just want the the activities in some rooms, it does not matter where... (I did not remove the basic compulsory constraints)

Also, do you think there are any possibilities regarding my post(s) above?

Thank you,
Catalin

[Liviu Lalescu]

But I do not want any space constraint. I just want the the activities in some rooms, it does not matter where... (I did not remove the basic compulsory constraints)

Also, do you think there are any possibilities regarding my post(s) above?

Thank you,
Catalin

The basic space constraints take care that the rooms are not overwhelmed: the capacity is respected and there is not a room with 2 activities at the same time. But there can be, for an activity, an unspecified room. This is necessary for some schools, to avoid impossible timetables.

Activity tag preferred room is possible easily. But I don't like this solution, because some users might use it wrongly and obtain impossible timetables. Normally, people should care that a certain subject goes into a chosen room. I'll think about this.

[catalin]

Thank you for your answer.

Regarding activity tag constraint: it would be simpler this way to allocate all "course" to a certain set of rooms, "seminars" to another set of rooms, etc.

I still don't know how could I get a timetable with rooms if I do not specify any space constraint (except basic space constraint)

Also, I've found out that the constraint in the menu "A teacher works in an hourly interval max days per week" has no effect. In my case, for me I've specified the interval "7.30-13" but FET allocates the activities all over the day.

Thank you again,
Catalin

[Liviu Lalescu]

Regarding activity tag constraint: it would be simpler this way to allocate all "course" to a certain set of rooms, "seminars" to another set of rooms, etc.

OK, I'll think about it and maybe will be done. You are right.

I still don't know how could I get a timetable with rooms if I do not specify any space constraint (except basic space constraint)

You cannot, because FET allows activities with unspecified room, because there are users who do not add rooms.

Also, I've found out that the constraint in the menu "A teacher works in an hourly interval max days per week" has no effect. In my case, for me I've specified the interval "7.30-13" but FET allocates the activities all over the day.

I think you are wrong. This constraint was verified. Did you specify interval 7.30-13 max days per week 0 (zero)?

[catalin]

I've specified the interval 7:30-9:25 as starting and 11:20-12:50 as ending and 5 at Max days per week, as in the attached file

Catalin