Semi-online hierarchical scheduling for lp-norm load balancing with buffer or rearrangements

In this paper, we consider the semi‐online hierarchical scheduling for load balancing on two identical machines. In the problem, the jobs are available online over list and the objective is to minimize the $l_p$ ‐norm of the two machines’ loads. Two semi‐online versions are investigated: the buffer version and the rearrangement version. We design a unified optimal semi‐online algorithm for both models.