Original Article

Proc IMechE Part B:

J Engineering Manufacture
1–13
An improved meta-heuristic approach Ó IMechE 2015
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DOI: 10.1177/0954405414564410

scheduling problem pib.sagepub.com

S Bathrinath1, S Saravanasankar1, SS Mahapatra2, Manas Ranjan Singh2

and SG Ponnambalam3

Abstract
This article considers the problem of scheduling n jobs on m identical parallel processors where an optimal schedule is
defined as one that produces minimum makespan (the completion time of the last job) and total tardiness among the set
of schedules. Such a problem is known as identical parallel processor makespan and total tardiness problem. In order to
minimize makespan and total tardiness of identical parallel processors, improved versions of particle swarm optimization
and harmony search algorithm are proposed to enhance scheduling performance with less computational burden. The
major drawback of particle swarm optimization in terms of premature convergence at initial stage of iterations is avoided
through the use of mutation, a commonly used operator in genetic algorithm, by introducing diversity in the solution.
The proposed algorithm is termed as particle swarm optimization with mutation. The convergence rate of harmony
search algorithm is improved by fine tuning of parameters such as pitch adjusting rate and bandwidth for improving the
solution. The performance of the schedules is evaluated in terms of makespan and total tardiness. The results are ana-
lyzed in terms of percentage deviation of the solution from the lower bound on makespan. The results indicate that par-
ticle swarm optimization with mutation produces better solutions when compared with genetic algorithm and particle
swarm optimization in terms of average percentage deviation. However, harmony search algorithm outperforms genetic
algorithm, particle swarm optimization, and particle swarm optimization with mutation in terms of average percentage
deviation. In certain instances, the solution obtained by harmony search algorithm outperforms existing clonal selection
particle swarm optimization.

Keywords
Identical parallel processors, genetic algorithm, particle swarm optimization, mutation, harmony search algorithm, make-
span, total tardiness

Date received: 29 June 2014; accepted: 17 November 2014

Introduction is processed on machine i. Each machine can process

Scheduling is a decision-making process primarily con-
cerned with allocation of operations on machines in
such a manner that some process performance mea-
sures such as makespan, tardiness, earliness, and flow
time can be minimized.1,2 The scheduling procedures
available today are not only quite realistic but also pos-
sess fast solution-generating capability. It finds wide-
spread applications in both manufacturing and service
industries.1 The parallel processor scheduling is one of
the scheduling scenarios that arise when a set of n jobs
available at time 0 needs to be processed on m identical
parallel processors (IPPs; machines). Each job has to
be processed without interruption on one of the avail-
able m machines with processing time pij where jth job
only one job at a time. Furthermore, the jobs cannot
be processed more than one machine at the same time.
The objective is to find a job schedule that can mini-
mize the makespan and total tardiness. The problem of
1
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kalasalingam University,
Krishnankoil, India
2
Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Institute of Technology
Rourkela, Rourkela, India
3
School of Engineering, Monash University Malaysia, Bandar Sunway,
Malaysia
Corresponding author:
SS Mahapatra, Department of Mechanical Engineering, National Institute
of Technology Rourkela, Rourkela 769008, India.
Email: mahapatrass2003@yahoo.com

Downloaded from pib.sagepub.com by guest on February 18, 2015

2 Proc IMechE Part B: J Engineering Manufacture
scheduling n jobs on m IPPs where an optimal schedule
is defined as one that gives the smallest makespan (the
completion time of the last job) and minimum total tar-
diness among the set of schedules is known as IPP
makespan and total tardiness problems (IPPMST).
Using the standard three field notations, makespan is
normally
P denoted as P k Cmax and total tardiness as
P k Tj , where P designates IPPs and the jobs that
are not constrained, Cmax represents makespan, and
STj denotes total tardiness. Such a scheduling scenario
is treated as NP-hard problem, and the exact solution
for small size problems has been reported using tradi-
tional operation research methods such as dynamic
programming and mixed-integer linear programming.3–8
However, the computational time and cost increase in a
non-polynomial manner for a reasonable size problem.
In practical situation, large-scale problems are dealt with
a view to obtain quick solutions at less computational
effort. As exact models cannot address this issue, a large
number of heuristics have been proposed for solving
IPPMST.9–15 Although heuristics generate good solu-
tions, the solution quality is far away from optimal solu-
tion. Therefore, nature-inspired algorithms like tabu
search (TS), simulated annealing (SA), genetic algorithm
(GA), and particle swarm optimization (PSO) are pro-
posed recently to generate approximate solutions close to
the optimum with considerably less computational
time.13,15–17 Among these algorithms, PSO is considered
as a robust algorithm for its computational efficiency
than other algorithms, and also it needs very few para-
meters for tuning the algorithm. In PSO, the whole algo-
rithm rests on two equations, namely, velocity and
position updation rules. Normally, swarm-based optimi-
zation algorithms trap at local optima where the algo-
rithm loses its diversity after few iterations. To avoid the
premature convergence, mutation operator has been bor-
rowed from GA to be embedded with PSO to avoid
being trapped in local optima. Furthermore, this algo-
rithm has been compared with the latest search-based
algorithm known as harmony search algorithm (HSA).
In this article, smallest position value (SPV) rule
proposed by Tasgetiren et al.,18 originally borrowed
from the random key representation of Bean,19 is used
for problem representation in PSO for sequencing the
jobs in IPPMST. Moreover, a non-uniform mutation
operator is incorporated when it is observed that search
procedure starts losing diversity and tends toward pre-
mature convergence.20 The results obtained from parti-
cle swarm optimization with mutation (MPSO) have
further been validated using HSA with SPV rule prob-
lem representation integrating Mahdavi et al.’s21 fine
tuning schemes.
Literature review
In order to solve identical parallel machine scheduling
problem, Lawler2 has proposed a transportation
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problem model when the job processing times are iden-
tical. Dogramaci3 has proposed a dynamic program-
ming algorithm to minimize total weighted tardiness.
Elmaghraby and Park4 have used a branch and bound
(B&B) technique to minimize some penalty functions
of tardiness considering identical due dates and pro-
cessing times. Later, this method is modified by Barnes
and Brennan,5 Azigzoglu and Kirca,6 and Yalaoui and
Chu7 to reduce the computational burden. Tanaka and
Araki8 have proposed a solution strategy based on
B&B algorithm with Lagrangian relaxation technique
to obtain a tight lower bound (LB). Most of the exact
methods are limited to solve generalized IPPMST
because they consider either equal processing times or
common due dates or both. Therefore, a number of
heuristic methods have been proposed to solve the
problem. To minimize mean tardiness on a single
machine, Wilkerson and Irwin22 have presented a heur-
istic method based on neighborhood search. This
method has been extended to solve the parallel machine
case by Baker and Scudder.23 Kim et al.24 have consid-
ered the problem of determining the allocation and
sequence of jobs on parallel machines for the objective
of minimizing total tardiness. Kumar et al.25 have pro-
posed a SA-fuzzy logic approach to select the optimal
weighted earliness–tardiness combinations in a non-
identical parallel machine environment. Dogramaci
and Surkis26 have implemented a heuristic method
based on list algorithms designed for parallel machine
problem. Ho and Chang27 have proposed a new mea-
surement technique called traffic congestion ratio com-
bining processing time and due dates to obtain traffic
priority index for job assignment. Simon and Andrew28
and Patrizia et al.29 have compared various heuristics
on similar instances to study the effectiveness of heuris-
tics. With the development of evolutionary computing
techniques, meta-heuristics procedures are used to solve
IPPMST problems to generate approximate solutions
close to the optimum with considerably less computa-
tional effort. GA has been applied by Bean19 to solve
IPPMST where a representation technique called ran-
dom keys is proposed to maintain feasibility from par-
ent to offspring in GA. With the objective of workflow
balancing, Rajakumar et al.30 used GA to solve parallel
machine scheduling problem. Chaudhry and Drake31
have presented a GA approach to minimize total tardi-
ness of a set of tasks for identical parallel machines and
worker assignment to machines. Koulamas32 has pro-
posed a polynomial decomposition heuristic and a
hybrid SA heuristic for the problem. Kim and Shin33
have implemented TS algorithm that schedules jobs on
parallel machines when release times and due dates of
jobs are known a priori and at sequence-dependent
setup times. Bilge et al.34 have developed a TS
approach to solve the IPPMST with sequence-
dependent setups on uniform parallel machines.
Anghinolfi and Paolucci35 have proposed a hybrid
Bathrinath et al.
meta-heuristic approach that integrates several features
of TS, SA, and variable neighborhood search (VNS)
for solving IPPMST.
For minimizing the makespan, Graham9 has used
well-known longest processing time (LPT) rule for
assigning the list of jobs to the least loaded machines.
Coffman et al.10 have proposed the MULTIFIT heuris-
tic and proved the close relation between the bin-
packing problem and maximum completion time prob-
lem. Lee and Massey11 have proposed COMBINE
heuristic that utilizes the LPT rule for an initial solution
and improves the schedule by MULTIFIT algorithm.
Gupta and Ruiz Torres12 have proposed LISTFIT
heuristic for minimizing makespan in identical parallel
machines with new LB). Kurz and Askin36 have investi-
gated a hybrid flexible flow line environment with iden-
tical parallel machines and non-anticipatory sequence-
dependent setup times with an objective to minimize
the makespan.
Min and Cheng13 have proposed GA for solving
large-scale identical parallel machine scheduling prob-
lem with too many jobs and machines to minimize
makespan. Kennedy and Eberhart37 have proposed
PSO algorithm having the capability of updating of
position and velocity of particles and quick conver-
gence to obtain near-optimal solutions. Tasgetiren et
al.18 have proposed a PSO for permutation flow shop
scheduling problem. Liao et al.38 and Liu et al.39 have
also used PSO in flow shop scheduling problem. Niu et
al.40 have proposed a clonal selection algorithm to
improve the swarm diversity and avoid premature con-
vergence. Geem et al.41 have proposed HSA, a nature-
inspired algorithm, mimicking the improvisation of
music players. The harmony in music is analogous to
the optimization solution vector, and the musician’s
improvisations are analogous to the local and global
search schemes in optimization techniques. It has been
successfully applied to various optimization problems
such as sequential quadratic programming, structural
optimization, and so on.21,42–44 Zhang et al.45 have
addressed the dynamic job shop scheduling problem
with random job arrivals and machine breakdowns.
Renna46 has adopted a pheromone-based approach in
creating schedules for the job shop environment in cel-
lular manufacturing systems. Rui et al.47 have devel-
oped bidirectional convergence ant colony algorithm to
solve the integrated job shop scheduling problem with
tool flow in flexible manufacturing system (FMS). Kim
and Lee48 have considered the scheduling problem in
hybrid flow shops with parallel machines at each serial
production stage where each job may visit each stage
several times, called the re-entrant flows. Marimuthu et
al.49 have addressed the problem of making sequencing
and scheduling decisions for n jobs in m machine flow
shops with a lot-sizing constraint. Pan et al.50 have pre-
sented a novel multiobjective particle swarm optimiza-
tion (MOPSO) algorithm for solving no-wait flow shop
scheduling problems with makespan and maximum tar-
diness criteria. Rossi and Dini51 have presented a GA
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3
for generalized job shop problem-solving, and the gen-
eralization includes feeding times, sequences of setup-
dependent operations, and jobs with different routings
among work centers including ‘‘multi-identical’’
machines. Wang and Brunn52 have proposed an effec-
tive GA for job shop sequencing and scheduling where
a simple heuristic rule is adapted and embedded into
the GA to avoid the production of unfeasible solutions.
Scheduling on IPPs
The scheduling of IPPs is regarded as one of the most-
studied classical scheduling problems that involve the
assignment of multiple jobs onto the machines. Among
the performance measures considered, makespan, total
tardiness, and earliness are commonly used to test the
schedules. The problem can be stated as follows: there
are n jobs waiting for being scheduled on m IPPs so as
to minimize makespan and total tardiness. The basic
assumptions need to be considered for solving IPPMST
problems are as follows:
1. All jobs can be processed on any of the parallel
machines.
2. Each of the parallel machines can process at most
one job at a time.
3. Each job has to be processed without interruption
on one of the machines.
4. All jobs are available to be processed at time 0.
5. No job can be processed by more than one
machine.
6. The processing time and the due date of the jobs,
the number of jobs, and the number of machines
are given and fixed.
7. No downtime is considered, and setup time is
included in processing time.
A set N = {J1, J2, ..., Jn} of n jobs are to be sched-
uled on a set M = {M1, M2, ..., Mm} of m identical par-
allel machines. The first objective is to find the optimal
schedule S = {S1, S2, ..., Sm} where Sj is a subset of jobs
assigned to machine Mj such that max{C1(S), C2(S), ...,
Cm(S)} = Cmax(S) is minimum where
X
Cj ðSÞ = pi ð1Þ
pi 2Sj
The following notations have been used for finding
total tardiness: i is the index of machine, i = 1, 2, ..., m,
where m is the number of machines;
P = fS1 , S2 , . . . , Sj , . . . , Ski g is the sequence of jobs
which are assigned to machine i; Sj is the index of job,
where j = 1, 2, ..., ki and ki represents the number of
total jobs to be processed by machine i; pSj is the pro-
cessing time of job Sj; STSj is the starting time of job
Sj; cSj is the completion time of job Sj; and dSj is the
due date of job Sj.
The IPP total tardiness can be represented mathema-
tically in the following manner
4 Proc IMechE Part B: J Engineering Manufacture
STS1 = 0
Constraint (2) describes the starting time of the
machine is equal to 0
cS1 = STS1 + pS1
Constraint (3) denotes the completion time of the
job in the sequence which is the summation of starting
time and the processing time of the particular job in the
sequence
STSj = cSj1 , j.1
cSj = STSj + pSj
The tardiness time of job Sj is calculated using the
following equation
 
TSj = max 0, cSj  dSj ð6Þ
The second objective of this article is to minimize
total tardiness which is defined using equation (7)
m X
X ki
T= TSj
i=1 j=1
The mixed-integer programming approach for IPP
machine scheduling problem formulated above can be
solved by B&B technique, but computational efforts
are prohibitive for large-scale problems.
PSO
PSO is inspired by the social behavior of bird flocking
and fish schooling. It is a population-based, bio-
inspired optimization algorithm originally introduced
by Kennedy and Eberhart.37 In PSO, particles are
called as potential solutions; each particle adjusts its
position based on its own experience as well as the
experience of a neighboring particle by utilizing the best
known position in the search space as well as the entire
swarm’s best known position. By adapting the global
and local exploration capabilities, PSO has maintained
its flexibility toward reaching the global optimal solu-
tions. The particles in PSO have their own memory that
enables to retain good solutions among all particles.
But in case of GA, the previous knowledge of the prob-
lem has been destroyed once the population changes
and chromosomes share their information with each
other. In PSO, previous best value is called as Pbest of
the particle and the best value of all the particles among
the Pbest in the swarm is called as Gbest. Compared with
GA, all the particles in PSO tend to converge to the
best solution quickly even in the local version in most
cases, and it does not require any kind of classical opti-
mization methods such as gradient descent and quasi-
Newton to solve optimization problem. Due to its sim-
plicity, easy implementation, and quick convergence,
PSO has gained much attention among the researchers
and has been successfully applied to a wide range of
applications in almost all fields of engineering.18,20
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ð2Þ The basic elements of PSO are summarized as fol-
lows: The particle Xti denotes the ith particle in the
swarm at iteration t and is represented by D number of
dimensions as Xti = ½xti1 , xti2 , . . . , xtiD  where xtij is the
ð3Þ position value of the ith particle with respect to the jth
dimension (j = 1, 2, ..., D). The population popt is the
set of r particles in the swarm at iteration t,
popt = ½Xt1 , Xt2 , . . . , Xtr . The permutation of the jobs is
represented by pti = ½pti1 , pti2 , . . . , ptin , where ptij is the
assignment of job j of the particle i in the permutation
ð4Þ at iteration t. The velocity of the particle is represented
as Vti = ½vti1 , vti2 , . . . , vtiD , where Vtij is the velocity of the
ð5Þ particle i at iteration t with respect to the jth dimension.
The inertia weight wt is a parameter to control the
impact of the previous velocities on current velocity.
For each particle, the personal best is defined as
Pti = ½pti1 , pti2 , . . . , ptiD , where ptij is the position value of
the ith personal best with respect to the jth dimension.
The global best is defined as Gt = ½gt1 , gt2 , . . . , gtD ,
where gtij is the position value of the ith global best with
respect to the jth dimension. The velocity and position
ð7Þ of the particles are updated in equations (8) and (9)
   
vtij = wt1 vt1 t1 t1
ij + c1 r1 pij  xij + c2 r2 gt1
j  xt1
ij
ð8Þ
xtij = xt1 + vtij ð9Þ
ij
where c1 and c2 are social and cognitive parameters and
r1 and r2 are uniform random numbers between (0, 1)
w = wt1 3 b ð10Þ
where b is the decrement factor. The updation of equa-
tions (8) and (9) may lead the particles moving toward
compound vector of global and local optimal solutions.
Proposed PSO algorithm
Solution representation
The solution representation is one of the important
issues when designing PSO. To maintain the bonding
between the problem domain and PSO particles for
IPPMST, D number of dimensions is represented for n
number of jobs. The particle Xti = ½xti1 , xti2 , . . . , xtiD  cor-
responds to the continuous position values for n num-
ber of jobs in IPPMST. The particle does not have the
capability of doing permutation by itself. Hence,
Tasgetiren et al.18 introduced SPV rule to determine
the permutation implied by the position values xtij of
particle Xti as shown in Table 1.
The smallest position in the table is xti4 =  2:92.
So, the dimension j = 4 is assigned to the first job
P ti1 = 4 in the permutation P ti . Similarly, next smallest
values are arranged in sequence. The different permuta-
tions at each iteration t can be obtained by updating
the position of each particle. The initial sequence of
jobs is P tij = ½4, 6, 3, 5, 2, 1. After calculating the
sequence of jobs by SPV rule, the jobs have been
Bathrinath et al.
Table 1. SPV rule.
Dimension, j 1 2
xijt 2.13 1.21
vijt 1.78 20.34
Jobs, P tij 4 6
SPV: smallest position value. The bold values shows the smallest position value.
Table 2. Processing times for the jobs.
Jobs j 1 2 3 4
pj 6 8 10 9 12
Table 3. Assignment of jobs using SPV rule.
Machines mi 1 2
pij 9(4)
12(5)
6(1)
SPV: smallest position value.
assigned to the machines with the same sequence. Let pj
be the processing time of n number of jobs as shown in
Table 2.
For example, there are two machines (m = 2) and six
jobs (n = 6). From the SPV rule, the fourth job occu-
pies the first position in the initial sequence. The corre-
sponding processing time of the particular job has been
taken from Table 2 and placed in the first machine as
shown in Table 3. Similarly, the sixth job in the initial
sequence occupies the second position. So, the corre-
sponding processing time for the sixth job from Table 3
has been placed in the second machine. Both the
machines have been assigned with two different jobs.
Among these machines, the machine that completes the
assigned job first is assigned with a new job from the
sequence in Table 1. In this case, second machine
assigned with job number 6 completes the job first as
processing time for the job is 7 units of time. The third
position in the sequence is job number 3 having the pro-
cessing time of 10 units of time. Hence, the second
machine is occupied by the job number 3. This process
is repeated until all the jobs are assigned to machines.
From Table 3, it is evident that job completion time of
first machine is 27 units of time and that of second
machine is 25 units of time. Hence, the makespan has
been considered as the maximum of the completion
time in all the machines. In this case, makespan is con-
sidered as 27 units of time. From Table 3, pij denotes
the processing time of the jth jobs in ith machine where
9(4) represents fourth job is processed having 9 units of
time.
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5
3 4 5 6
21.20 22.92 0.97 21.91
21.8 1.54 20.81 0.6
3 5 2 1
Mutation operator
Mutation operator adopted from GA tends to alter one
5 6
or more gene values in a chromosome from the initial
7 state. This leads to the generation of new gene value
that is being added to the gene pool. Moreover, GA
can be able to attain better solution than the previous
one through these newly generated genes. Hence, muta-
tion is an important operator of the genetic search as it
helps to avoid local optimal by preventing the popula-
tion of chromosomes. In case of PSO, the lack of popu-
7(6) lation diversity among the swarms is considered as a
10(3) factor for the convergence on local minima. Hence, the
8(2) PSO has been incorporated with mutation operator to
enhance its global search capacity and to improve per-
formance. In this article, a non-uniform mutation oper-
ator by Michalewicz20 has been incorporated in PSO
which helps to mutate some particles selected randomly
from the swarm. If the number of iterations with no
diversity in the solution exceeds, mutation is carried
out. This operator works by changing a particle posi-
tion dimension (xiD )

xiD + deltaðt, U  xiD Þ : rb = 1
MutateðxiD Þ = ð11Þ
xiD + deltaðt, xiD  LÞ : rb = 0
where t is the current iteration number, U is the upper
bound value of the particle dimension, L is the LB value
of the particle dimension, rb is the randomly generated
bit, and delta (t, y) returns the value in the range [0:y]
 
b
deltaðt, yÞ = y 1  r(1t=T) ð12Þ
where r is the random number generated from the uni-
form distribution range [0:1], T is the maximum num-
ber of iteration, and b is the tunable parameter which is
set as 5 by Michalewicz.19 The pseudo-code for the pro-
posed MPSO is given as follows:
Initialize the parameters, including swarm size, maxi-
mum number of iteration, w, c1, c2
While (termination condition i.e. maximum Iteration)
Do
t=0
Initialize particle’s position and velocity stochastically;
Apply SPV rule;
Evaluate each particle’s fitness using the objective
function;
Initialize pbest position;
6 Proc IMechE Part B: J Engineering Manufacture

Initialize gbest position with the particle with lowest fit-

ness in the swarm;
t = t + 1;
Update the velocity of the particles by equation (8);
Update the position of the particles by equation (9);
Apply SPV rule;
Evaluate each particle’s fitness using the objective
function;
Perform mutation if t \ (Tmax* PMUT) where Tmax is
maximum number of iteration and PMUT is probabil-
ity of mutation;
Find the new gbest and pbest values by comparison;
Update gbest of the swarm and pbest of each particle;
end do
end

The pseudo-code has been further explained with the

introduction of flow chart as shown in Figure 1.

HSA
Geem et al.41 introduced an interesting meta-heuristic
algorithm called HSA. It is population based and
mimics the musical process of searching for a better
state of harmony such as jazz improvisation. It has its
own advantages over traditional optimization tech-
niques by having great power in global search and its
simplicity in both concept and implementation. Due to
its advantages and novelty, HSA has received increas-
ing attention among the researchers and has been vigor-
ously applied to various engineering optimization
problems. One of the finest qualities of HSA is the iden-
tification of high-performance regions of the solution Figure 1. Flow chart for MPSO algorithm.
space at a reasonable time. However, while performing
the local search for numerical application, it is not able
to withstand at its best. Hence, fine tuning the HSA columns consists of the variables of each solution
characteristics becomes inevitable. In order to improve (jobs). Each solution xi is considered as a one-
such fine tuning characteristics and convergence rate, dimensional array. The size of the array can be
Mahdavi et al.21 have proposed an improved harmony designed by the maximum number of jobs considered
search which has the fine tuning feature of mathemati- in the problem instance. HM is represented as given in
cal techniques having the potential of outperforming
equation (13)
traditional HSA. This algorithm uses harmony memory
2 3
considering rate (HMCR) and pitch adjusting rate x11 x12 ... x1K1 x1K
(PAR) for finding the solution vector in the search 6 x2 x22 ... x2K1 x1K 7
6 1 7
space. The optimization procedure of HSA is given in 6 : : : : : 7
6 7
the following steps. HM = 6 6 : : : : : 7
7
6 : : : : : 7
6 7
1. Initialization of the harmony memory (HM); 4 xHMS1 xHMS1 . . . xHMS1 xHMS1 5
1 2 K1 K
2. Improvisation of a new HM; xHMS
1 xHMS
2 . . . xHMS
K1 xHMS
K
3. Updation of the HM; ð13Þ
4. Checking for the stopping criteria. Otherwise
repeat steps 2 and 3.
Improvisation of new HM
Initialization of HM The divergence and convergence of the search in HSA
A set of initial solutions of harmony memory size has been maintained during this process. HMCR and
(HMS) is generated to build the HM, which is repre- PAR are considered as the main parameters for conver-
sented by a matrix of two dimensions where rows con- gence or divergence of the search capability by
sists of a set of solutions xi (population size), while Mahdavi et al.21 Here, the new solutions are

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Bathrinath et al.
constructed stochastically using one of the following
three operators: (1) memory consideration (based on
the HMCR), (2) random consideration (based on
1 2 HMCR), and (3) pitch adjustment (based on the
PAR). For the memory consideration, the value of the
first decision variable (x01 ) has been taken from any of
the values as specified in HM range (x01  x01 HMS).
The other decision variable values (x02 , x03 , . . . , x0K ) have
also been taken in the same manner
   been increased, and this leads to optimal solution. Still
x0 i 2 x1i , x2i , :::, xHMS with probability HMCR
x0i i there has been a probability of having a dispute by
x0 i 2 X0 i with probability (1  HMCR)
Each and every component obtained by the memory
consideration is analyzed to determine whether the
pitch should be adjusted
Pitch adjusting decision for x0i
 sorted out
Yes with probabilty PAR
No with probabilty (1  PAR)
If the pitch adjustment decision for x0i is Yes, then x0i
is replaced as follows
x0i x0i 6randðÞ  bw
where bw represents an arbitrary distance bandwidth
and rand() represents random number between 0 and 1.
By considering HM, pitch adjustment has been
applied to each variable of the new HM vector. These
improvisation steps are almost similar to reproduction
in GA which uses crossover and mutation operators.
Thus, the improvisation utilizes the full HM to con-
struct the solutions, but in case of GA, new chromo-
somes are generated by crossover of two parents or
mutation. While considering the operators in GA, it
needs to be carefully designed for highly constrained
problems for reaching out its optimal solutions.
Updation of HM
If the new harmony vector, (x0 = x01 , x02 , . . . , x0K ), is bet-
ter than the worst in the HM, judged in terms of the
objective function value, the new harmony is included
in the HM, and the existing worst harmony is removed
from the HM.
Check for stopping criteria
If the maximum number of improvisations (stopping
criterion) is satisfied, computation is terminated.
Otherwise steps 2 and 3 will be repeated.
Proposed HSA
In HM vector, each member in the population pool is
converted to job schedule using SPV rule–based prob-
lem representation discussed in section ‘‘Solution repre-
sentation’’ for getting the initial sequence of jobs and
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7
assignment of jobs to the machines to calculate the
objective function. The traditional HSA only uses fixed
values for both PAR and bw. These values have been
adjusted in the initialization step and not been changed
during new generations. This has been considered as
the main drawback of traditional HSA. Hence, the
need has been raised to sort out these issues. However,
by fine tuning the optimized solution vectors using the
parameters such as PAR and bw, convergence rate has
assigning small and larger values for PAR and bw or
ð14Þ vice versa. Hence, the parameter values need to be
selected judiciously. Fesanghary et al.42 have developed
one of such fine tuning parameters for PAR and bw for
reducing the dispute among the values given to their
parameters. It has been reported that using equation
stated below for PAR and bw, these issues have been
ð15Þ
ðPARmax  PARmin Þ
PARðgnÞ = PARmin + 3 gn ð17Þ
NI
where PAR represents the pitch adjusting rate for each
generation, PARmin represents the minimum pitch
ð16Þ adjusting rate, PARmax denotes the maximum pitch
adjusting rate, NI denotes the number of solution vec-
tor generations, and gn represents the generation
number.
For bandwidth, tuning has been done using the fol-
lowing equation
bwðgnÞ = bwmax expðc:gnÞ ð18Þ
where c = Ln(bwmin =bwmax )=NI, bw(gn) denotes the
bandwidth for each generation, bwmax denotes the max-
imum bandwidth, and bwmin represents the minimum
bandwidth.
Results and discussions
The computation study aims to analyze the perfor-
mance of MPSO and HSA to minimize makespan and
total tardiness for the IPP scheduling. The algorithms
are coded in MATLAB R2010a and executed in IntelÒ
Coreä i5 CPU M430 at 2.27 GHz with 4 GB RAM.
The benchmark problems have been taken from
Tanaka and Araki8 and are also available at https://
sites.google.com/site/shunjitanaka/pmtt. Fisher53 has
proposed the standard method for generating these
problems. The integer processing times pj (1 4 j 4 n) of
these problems have been generated from the uniform
distribution between [1, 100]. The
P total processing times
have been computed by P = nj= 1 pj , the due dates dj
(1 4 j 4 n) have been generated using the uniform dis-
tribution ½P(1  t  R=2)=m, P(1  t + R=2)=m,
where n is the number of jobs, m is the number of
machines, and t is the tardiness factor, and due date
range is changed by n = 20, m = {2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9,
10}, t = {0.2, 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, 1.0}, and R = {0.2, 0.4, 0.6,
8 Proc IMechE Part B: J Engineering Manufacture

0.8, 1.0}. For every combination of m, n, t, and R, five

problems have been generated. There are five charac-
teristics which are used to represent the problem: num-
ber of jobs, number of machines, tardiness, due date
range, and position of the instance. For example, the
notation of problem 20_03_04_08_001 represents the
first problem of three machines, 20-job, t = 0.4, and
R = 8. Among these benchmark problems, 30 problems
have been randomly selected for testing and analysis of
proposed algorithms. MPSO parameter settings are as
follows: the inertial weight w is set as 0.6, both social
and cognitive parameters are set as 1.04, and the decre-
ment factor b is set as 0.7. The maximum number of
iterations taken for MPSO is 15,000. HSA parameter
settings are as follows: HMCR value as 0.9, PARmin as
0.4, PARmax as 0.9, bwmin as 0.0001, and bwmax as 1.0. Figure 2. Convergence curve for makespan with MPSO for
The maximum number of iteration taken for HSA is the problem 20_10_02_08_001.
5000. For calculating GA, single-point crossover opera-
tion and swap mutation operation have been adopted.
The crossover rate and the mutation rate are set as 0.85
and 0.1, respectively.
The MPSO algorithm has been tested with GA and
PSO. In all the cases, the percentage deviation (PD) of
MPSO is better than GA and PSO. HSA has been tested
with the same benchmark problem where the PD value
of HSA is better than GA, PSO, and MPSO. The results
are represented in terms of PD of the solution from the
LB reported by Gupta and Ruiz Torres.12 The LB has
been calculated using the equation given below

LB = max max pi ; P=m ð19Þ
14i4n

Best Makespan  LB
PD = 3 100 ð20Þ
LB
The average percentage deviation (APD) of the pro- Figure 3. Convergence curve for makespan with HSA for the
posed MPSO has been tested with GA and PSO in problem 20_10_02_08_001.
IPPMST. The APD can be calculated as follows

P
I
The improvement rate of MPSO with respect to GA
PDðLÞ
L is 68.3% and with respect to PSO is 38.5%. The con-
APD = ð21Þ vergence curve for makespan with MPSO is presented
I
in Figure 2.
where I is the total number of problems and L stands Similarly, the improvement rate for HSA can be
for index of the problem. defined as follows
From Table 4, it is observed that the calculated
value of APD for GA is 0.2686 and PSO is 0.1385. The Improvement rate ð%Þ
APD value obtained by using MPSO is 0.0851. Based ð23Þ
ðAPDGA, PSO, MPSO  APDHSA Þ
on APD comparisons, MPSO turns out to be superior =
APDGA, PSO, MPSO
to GA and PSO, whereas the performance of GA is
worst among all algorithms. The APD value for HSA The improvement performance of HSA with respect
is 0.0523. It clearly shows HSA is superior to GA, to GA is 80.5%, with respect to PSO is 62.2%, and
PSO, and MPSO. with respect to MPSO is 39.9%. The convergence curve
The improvement rate in APD using MPSO can be for makespan with HSA is presented in Figure 3. The
defined as follows results of GA, PSO, MPSO, and HSA for makespan
and their corresponding APD values are shown in
ðAPDGA, PSO  APDMPSO Þ
Improvement rate ð%Þ = Table 4.
APDGA, PSO
The same benchmark problem has been tested with
ð22Þ total tardiness, and same instances of the problems

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 Table 4. APD values for makespan.

m n Benchmark problem LB GA PSO MPSO HSA PD of GA = PD of PSO = PD of MPSO = PD of HSA =

(LB 2 GA)/LB (LB 2 PSO)/LB (LB 2 MPSO)/LB (LB 2 HSA)/LB
Bathrinath et al.

3 20 20_03_04_08_001 397 433 415 411 402 0.0907 0.0453 0.0353 0.0126
4 20 20_04_02_02_001 298 327 307 304 299 0.0973 0.0302 0.0201 0.0034
4 20 20_04_02_02_002 235 272 251 242 236 0.1574 0.0681 0.0298 0.0043
4 20 20_04_02_02_003 321 335 324 323 322 0.0436 0.0093 0.0062 0.0031
5 20 20_05_02_02_001 238 272 251 246 239 0.1429 0.0546 0.0336 0.0042
6 20 20_06_02_02_001 199 224 205 204 200 0.1256 0.0302 0.0251 0.0050
7 20 20_07_02_02_001 170 191 178 174 172 0.1235 0.0471 0.0235 0.0118
8 20 20_08_02_02_001 149 171 159 156 152 0.1477 0.0671 0.0470 0.0201
9 20 20_09_02_02_001 132 157 141 137 134 0.1894 0.0682 0.0379 0.0152
10 20 20_10_02_02_001 119 145 132 131 125 0.2185 0.1092 0.1008 0.0504
10 20 20_10_02_02_002 95 121 110 106 102 0.2737 0.1579 0.1158 0.0737
10 20 20_10_02_02_003 128 170 151 148 141 0.3281 0.1797 0.1563 0.1016
10 20 20_10_02_02_004 99 134 119 112 111 0.3535 0.2020 0.1313 0.1212
10 20 20_10_02_02_005 100 142 116 110 106 0.4200 0.1600 0.1000 0.0600
10 20 20_10_02_04_001 119 160 142 131 125 0.3445 0.1933 0.1008 0.0504
10 20 20_10_02_04_002 95 132 117 102 99 0.3895 0.2316 0.0737 0.0421
10 20 20_10_02_04_003 128 169 151 148 141 0.3203 0.1797 0.1563 0.1016
10 20 20_10_02_04_004 99 132 119 112 110 0.3333 0.2020 0.1313 0.1111
10 20 20_10_02_04_005 100 130 116 109 106 0.3000 0.1600 0.0900 0.0600
10 20 20_10_02_06_001 119 154 142 131 125 0.2941 0.1933 0.1008 0.0504
10 20 20_10_02_06_002 95 140 118 110 101 0.4737 0.2421 0.1579 0.0632
10 20 20_10_02_06_003 128 159 140 133 130 0.2422 0.0938 0.0391 0.0156
10 20 20_10_02_06_004 99 130 119 112 110 0.3131 0.2020 0.1313 0.1111
10 20 20_10_02_06_005 100 142 116 109 106 0.4200 0.1600 0.0900 0.0600
10 20 20_10_02_08_001 119 142 131 127 125 0.1933 0.1008 0.0672 0.0504

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10 20 20_10_02_08_002 95 137 117 102 99 0.4421 0.2316 0.0737 0.0421
10 20 20_10_02_08_003 128 173 151 148 141 0.3516 0.1797 0.1563 0.1016
10 20 20_10_02_08_004 99 132 119 112 110 0.3333 0.2020 0.1313 0.1111
10 20 20_10_02_08_005 100 126 116 109 106 0.2600 0.1600 0.0900 0.0600
10 20 20_10_02_10_001 119 159 142 131 125 0.3361 0.1933 0.1008 0.0504
Average percentage deviation 0.2686 0.1385 0.0851 0.0523

APD: average percentage deviation; LB: lower bound; GA: genetic algorithm; PSO: particle swarm optimization; MPSO: particle swarm optimization with mutation; HSA: harmony search algorithm; PD: percentage
deviation.
9
10 Proc IMechE Part B: J Engineering Manufacture

Table 5. Total tardiness value comparison.

m n Benchmark problem OPT CSPSO GA PSO MPSO HSA

3 20 20_03_04_08_001 240 – 460 448 432 250

4 20 20_04_02_02_001 144 – 175 158 148 144
4 20 20_04_02_02_002 105 105 122 109 108 105
4 20 20_04_02_02_003 151 – 210 192 161 157
5 20 20_05_02_02_001 149 – 181 163 156 149
6 20 20_06_02_02_001 161 – 193 178 175 168
7 20 20_07_02_02_001 164 – 201 188 178 167
8 20 20_08_02_02_001 177 – 210 192 181 177
9 20 20_09_02_02_001 181 – 205 188 182 181
10 20 20_10_02_02_001 195 – 224 206 201 196
10 20 20_10_02_02_002 135 136.6 152 144 139 136
10 20 20_10_02_02_003 202 – 233 220 206 203
10 20 20_10_02_02_004 180 180 202 195 182 180
10 20 20_10_02_02_005 157 – 200 184 174 160
10 20 20_10_02_04_001 165 – 191 176 167 167
10 20 20_10_02_04_002 85 86.5 129 115 87 85
10 20 20_10_02_04_003 151 – 193 178 162 152
10 20 20_10_02_04_004 162 165.8 186 171 165 162
10 20 20_10_02_04_005 108 – 158 138 135 118
10 20 20_10_02_06_001 161 – 189 174 164 163
10 20 20_10_02_06_002 35 36.7 69 58 39 36
10 20 20_10_02_06_003 122 – 165 147 127 125
10 20 20_10_02_06_004 157 159.4 188 172 159 157
10 20 20_10_02_06_005 83 – 133 125 118 98
10 20 20_10_02_08_001 170 – 223 204 177 173
10 20 20_10_02_08_002 24 24.3 71 63 36 24
10 20 20_10_02_08_003 120 – 156 138 128 122
10 20 20_10_02_08_004 164 169.6 220 199 178 172
10 20 20_10_02_08_005 78 – 128 102 88 81
10 20 20_10_02_10_001 177 – 241 216 204 184

OPT: optimal solution; PSO: particle swarm optimization; CSPSO: clonal selection particle swarm optimization; GA: genetic algorithm; HSA:
harmony search algorithm; MPSO: particle swarm optimization with mutation.

have been compared with clonal selection PSO

(CSPSO) reported by Niu et al.40 and also the optimal
solution (OPT) reported by Tanaka and Araki.8 The
results for total tardiness are shown in Table 5. The
comparison with instances by Niu et al.40 indicates that
the total tardiness value by HSA is either exactly
matching or better for eight instances out of nine
instances. For instances 20_04_02_02_002 and
20_10_02_02_004, total tardiness value by CSPSO are
105 and 180, respectively, and same values are obtained
by HSA. For the instance 20_10_02_02_002, the aver-
age total tardiness value by CSPSO is reported as
136.6, whereas the corresponding value by HSA is 136.
For the instance 20_10_02_04_002, total tardiness val-
ues by CSPSO and OPT are 86.5 and 85, respectively,
whereas HSA results in total tardiness of 85. For Figure 4. Convergence curve for total tardiness using MPSO
instances 20_10_02_04_004, 20_10_02_06_002, and for the problem 20_10_02_08_001.
20_10_02_06_004, total tardiness values by HSA are
better than CSPSO. However, in case of the instance
20_10_02_08_004, CSPSO results in better total tardi- Figures 4 and 5. PSO, originally proposed by Kennedy
ness value as compared to HSA. This is to be noted and Eberhart,37 is mainly used in continuous optimiza-
that total tardiness value produced by HSA is similar tion problems due to quick solutions. However, it has
or superior to GA, PSO, and MPSO. Out of 30 an inherent drawback of premature convergence at ini-
instances, the total tardiness value for 9 instances is tial stage of iterations. The limitations of the PSO can
comparable with results produced by HSA. The con- be overcome by the use of mutation, a commonly used
vergence curves for the total tardiness are shown in operator in GA, through introduction of diversity in

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Bathrinath et al.
Figure 5. Convergence curve of total tardiness using HSA for
the problem 20_10_02_08_001.
the solution. The proposed algorithm is termed as
MPSO. MPSO is found to perform better than GA and
PSO, in both continuous and combinatorial optimiza-
tion problems. However, a newly developed meta-
heuristics known as HSA is simple in concept and easy
for implementation. HSA needs only few parameters to
be tuned like PSO. Since HSA is a population-based
meta-heuristic, the multiple harmonic groups can be
used in parallel. This parallelism technique usually
leads to better establishment with higher efficiency.
Hence, fine balance of intensification and diversifica-
tion as well as the good combination of parallelism
with elitism is the key to the success of HSA and, in
fact, to the success of any meta-heuristic algorithm.
Thus, HSA performs better than GA, PSO, and
MPSO.
Conclusion
In this article, two new meta-heuristic approaches have
been presented for minimizing makespan and total tar-
diness in IPP scheduling problems. In the first
approach, PSO has been modified using a mutation
operator and job sequence using SPV rule. In the sec-
ond approach, HSA has been improved using the
Mahdavi et al.21 parameter in PAR and bw, and the
sequence of job has been obtained through SPV rule.
The scheduling performance by both the algorithms
has been compared with GA and PSO. It is found that
the performance of MPSO is superior to GA and PSO.
However, it is to be noted that HSA outperforms GA,
PSO, and MPSO. Both the algorithms happen to be
novel in the field of scheduling. The study provides a
framework for practicing engineers and managers to
schedule large-scale IPP with less computational bur-
den. However, tuning of algorithmic parameters is vital
to obtain best schedules. Both the algorithms are
extremely simple to implement. Although the proposed
algorithms have been tested in IPPMST, the approach
can be extended to flow shop, job shop, flexible low
shop, flexible job shop, FMS, and resource-constrained
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11
project scheduling problem. The mapping of continu-
ous position values of PSO or HM vector of HSA to
schedule can be made with application of SPV rule with
little modification. In case of continuous optimization
problems, for example, process optimization, both the
proposed algorithms can be applied without the need
of application of SPV rule. However, combinatorial
problems require the generation of combination by the
use of SPV rule. Application of the proposed algo-
rithms to combinatorial case makes problems more
complex than continuous counterpart, and preservation
of diversity of solution becomes an important issue. In
this study, the processing time is assumed to be deter-
ministic and machines are perfectly reliable. In future,
the algorithms may be modified to incorporate stochas-
tic processing times and machine unreliability for sol-
ving IPPMST. Although the study applies SPV rule for
generation of job schedule, other mapping methods
may be explored in conjunction with the proposed
algorithm to study the performance of the algorithms
in IPPMST.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.
Funding
This research received no specific grant from any fund-
ing agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit
sectors.
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