Local search and constraint programming for the post enrolment‐based course timetabling problem

We present a variety of approaches for solving the post enrolment‐based course timetabling problem, which was proposed as Track 2 of the 2007 International Timetabling Competition. We approach the problem using local search and constraint programming techniques. We show how to take advantage of a list‐colouring relaxation of the problem. Our local search approach won Track 2 of the 2007 competition. Our best constraint programming approach uses an original problem decomposition. Incorporating this into a large neighbourhood search scheme seems promising, and provides motivation for studying complete approaches in further detail.