A genetic algorithm for multi-objective job shop scheduling

A kind of general algorithm framework is developed based on coevolutionary genetic algorithm, in which tradeoff information between objectives is adopted to elicit the preference relation of the decision maker over the objectives for determining the satisfied schedule. In addition, heuristics are integrated with genetic algorithm in an effort to improve the searching efficiency. Finally, the algorithm is applied to solving the job shop scheduling problem with sequence-dependent setup times, which minimizes both the makespan Cmax and mean tardiness. The results show the effectiveness of the algorithm.