Search

After using evolutionary techniques for single-objective optimization during more than two decades, the incorporation of more than one objective in the fitness function has finally become a popular area of research. As a consequence, many new evolutionary-based approaches and variations of existing techniques have recently been published in the technical literature. The purpose of this paper is to summarize and organize the information on these current approaches, emphasizing the importance of analyzing the operations research techniques in which most of them are based, in an attempt to motivate researchers to look into these mathematical programming approaches for new ways of exploiting the search capabilities of evolutionary algorithms. Furthermore, a summary of the main algorithms behind these approaches is provided, together with a brief criticism that includes their advantages and disadvantages, degree of applicability, and some known applications. Finally, future trends in this area and some possible paths for further research are also addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because of the natural way in which subsystems are cast into subproblems, resource- directive decomposition methods of mathematical programming problems have attracted considerable attention in recent years. A review of the specialized literature is presented in this paper, where the features and drawbacks of the most representative resource-directive methods are analyzed. To give an appropriate chronological and technical perspective, early general methods, such as the ones of Dantzig-Wolfe and Benders, are also included in the survey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Complexity and variety of modern multiobjective optimisation problems result in the emergence of numerous search techniques, from traditional mathematical programming to various randomised heuristics. A key issue raised consequently is how to evaluate and compare solution sets generated by these multiobjective search techniques. In this article, we provide a comprehensive review of solution set quality evaluation. Starting with an introduction of basic principles and concepts of set quality evaluation, this article summarises and categorises 100 state-of-the-art quality indicators, with the focus on what quality aspects these indicators reflect. This is accompanied in each category by detailed descriptions of several representative indicators and in-depth analyses of their strengths and weaknesses. Furthermore, issues regarding attributes that indicators possess and properties that indicators are desirable to have are discussed, in the hope of motivating researchers to look into these important issues when designing quality indicators and of encouraging practitioners to bear these issues in mind when selecting/using quality indicators. Finally, future trends and potential research directions in the area are suggested, together with some guidelines on these directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The survey paper "Comparative Models of the File Assignment Problem" by researchers L. A. Dowdy and D. V. Foster, published in the June 1982 issue of the periodical Computing Surveys, defines a number of parameters which are considered important for the File Assignment Problem (FAP). It subsequently utilizes the parameters to formulate mathematically and assess capabilities of 12 distinct models appearing in the literature. A closer look at the first three models reveals that they are expressed as mathematical programming problems concerned with the optimization of the minimum operation cost which is measured in dollars and that no timing parameters like response, access, execution and transfer appear either in the FAP objective function or constraints. With reference to these three models, we wish to make four observations related to further models and studies of FAP that are not pointed out in the paper. The first model considers the number and placement of copies of a single file when the anticipated file usage is static.