The development of a general algorithmic procedure for university examination timetabling

The problem of scheduling university examinations is becoming difficult for examination officers especially when they have to construct the timetables manually. It is largely due to the increasing number of students and greater freedom in choosing the courses. Examination officers would have to spend a considerable amount of time checking for student conflicts so that no student would have to sit for more than one exam at any one time. There are also other limitations such as the number of examination rooms, the length of the examination period and others. The examination timetabling problem varies between institutions, depending on their particular needs and limited resources. Most of the existing computerised examination timetabling systems found in the literature are developed and used by particular institutions. Therefore, the aim of the research is to produce a general computerised system for timetabling examinations which can be used by most universities. The research is done in two stages; the first stage involves carrying out a survey on the university examination timetabling systems and the second stage is the construction of a university examination timetabler incorporating the common objectives and constraints found in the survey. The survey was carried out to determine the extent to which the computerised examination timetabling procedures are used, to identify the objectives and constraints which are commonly considered when constructing examination timetables and to evaluate the effectiveness of the existing examination timetabling systems in achieving the objectives and satisfying the constraints The construction of the general examination timetabling system is done in two parts. In the first part, a new algorithmic rule is developed to assign exams to the minimum number of sessions without creating conflicts for any student. The rule adopts a clique initialisation strategy as a starting point and a graph colouring approach for assigning the exams. This rule is also quite capable of scheduling exams to the sessions which are as close as to the least number of sessions possible, without having to carry out any backtracking process. The backtracking process can sometimes be time consuming if there are a lot of exams firstly to be scheduled, and secondly clashing with each other. The second part of the work involves minimising the total number of students taking two exams on the same day and scheduling large exams early in the examination period subject to a specified time limit on the overall examination period and a maximum number of students that may be examined in any session. A swapping rule was introduced where exams in one of the sessions in any day with large number of sameday exams are interchanged with exams in other sessions which will reduce the total number of same-day exams. The experimentation showed that if the swapping procedures are repeated three times, the total number of same-day exams will be reduced by 50%. The total number of same-day exams will be reduced even more if some extra sessions can be added to the initial minimum number of sessions. A simple rule was devised to schedule large exams early in the examination period

Modified Russell network model for determining Malaysia water supply services performance

A black-box analysis of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) has been widely used to measure water supply services performance. It is a single process, which does not take into account the internal structure of the operation. However, in the production of water supply services, rather than a black-box analysis, the operation can be expressed into a two-stage network process and therefore can be analysed using Network Data Envelopment Analysis (NDEA). Furthermore, the Network Russell (NR) model is one of many other models in NDEA. A modified NR model is introduced in this study, which incorporated an undesirable output factor and will be called Network Russell with Undesirable Output (NR-OU) model. The NROU model has been tested on data of water supply from 14 states in Malaysia and the results provide information about the stages or processes in the operation that needs more attention in order to improve the Malaysian water supply services performance

Penggunaan kaedah analisis regresi teguh untuk menentukan kecekapan relatif

This study discusses the use of robust regression analysis using the least trimmed of squares method to evaluate the relative efficiency of decision making units in organizations in the case of the existance of outliers and the effect of nonhomogeneus outside factor. Efficiency unit evaluated in this study is the efficiency of hospital physicians where the service cost is the input and the number of high severity discharges and low severity discharges of patients as the outputs. The results show that the estimation of the unit efficiency using LTS method is more stable

An Alternative Approach to Reduce Dimensionality in Data Envelopment Analysis

Principal component analysis reduces dimensionality; however, uncorrelated components imply the existence of variables with weights of opposite signs. This complicates the application in data envelopment analysis. To overcome problems due to signs, a modification to the component axes is proposed and was verified using Monte Carlo simulations

Penambahbaikan Sumber Jabatan Kecemasan menggunakan kaedah simulasi dan analisis pengumpulan data

Jabatan Kecemasan Pusat Perubatan Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (PPUKM) menerima kedatangan pesakit yang ramai pada setiap hari menyebabkan jabatan ini kerap berdepan dengan masalah kesesakan. Justeru, objektif kajian ini adalah mengenal pasti model pengoptimuman terbaik untuk menambahbaik sumber bagi meningkatkan tahap kecekapan Jabatan Kecemasan PPUKM dan menyelesaikan masalah kesesakan jabatan. Kaedah simulasi digunakan bagi membina model jabatan kecemasan dengan pemboleh ubah yang digunakan dalam pemodelan simulasi ini adalah dikhususkan berdasarkan zon atau ruang rawatan. Alternatif penambahbaikan yang dicadangkan ini mengandungi konfigurasi bilangan sumber jabatan yang baru. Enam model gabungan yang digunakan terdiri daripada Model CCR dan Set Rujukan, Model BCC dan Set Rujukan, Model CCR dan Kecekapan-Super, Model BCC dan Kecekapan-Super, Model Bi-Objektif MCDEA-CCR dan Kecekapan Silang dan Model Bi-Objektif MCDEA-BCC dan Kecekapan Silang. Model Bi-Objektif MCDEA-BCC merupakan lanjutan kepada Model Bi-Objektif MCDEA-CCR daripada kajian terdahulu. Keputusan kajian menunjukkan Model Bi-Objektif MCDEA-BCC yang dibina telah memberikan bilangan alternatif penambahbaikan cekap yang paling kecil berbanding model-model gabungan lain. Melalui model gabungan ini juga satu alternatif penambahbaikan yang optimum yang telah dicadangkan dapat mengurangkan masa menunggu pesakit di Zon Hijau sebanyak 51% manakala peratusan penggunaan tenaga kerja sumber berjaya ditambahbaik agar lebih munasabah. Alternatif ini memerlukan susun atur kembali kedudukan sumber tanpa melakukan perubahan yang besar ke atas sistem asal

Penilaian terhadap kecekapan relatif industri pengagihan elektrik di Selangor menggunakan kaedah analisis penyampulan data (APD)

This study is carried out to evaluate and identify the efficiency of the usage of resources by Tenaga National Berhad (TNB) in ten electricity distribution areas in Selangor. Based on the data of three inputs and two outputs for the year 2002,an input-oriented CCR model is used and it appears that four out of ten electricity distribution areas in Selangor are efficient. For each of the inefficient areas, this model identifies the sources and the level of inefficiency for each input and output. A set of targets for each input and output is determined for six inefficient areas. Using the average magnitude for each input, the results show that operational and maintenance expenditure is the most important input (61.86%), followed by the expenditure on main equipment (14.34%)

Estimating emergency department maximum capacity using simulation and data envelopment analysis

Recently, the number of Emergency Department visits in UKM Medical Centre has increased rapidly. This has encouraged several healthcare problems occur in the emergency department such as overcrowding. A study was conducted to estimate the maximum possible demand that able to serve by the emergency department with current number of resources. Discrete Event Simulation method was applied to model the Emergency Department system. The model was used to study the behavior of waiting time of the emergency department visits and predict the maximum demand. Finally, combination of Data Envelopment Analysis methods (BCC input-oriented and Super-efficiency-BCC) was used in order to determine the new configuration of number of resources (doctor and nurse) required to maintain their efficient services. Results assume that the Emergency Department capable to accommodate 230 patients per day with an additional doctor to Yellow Zone Treatment Area and new schedule time for Green Zone doctors

Kepentingan output tidak diingini bagi menentukan kecekapan utiliti air di Malaysia

Pengurusan air yang tidak cekap akan membebankan rakyat Malaysia. Pihak syarikat pengurusan air perlu menggunakan sumber secara optimum dan mengelakkan pembaziran. Untuk mengenal pasti kecekapan syarikat pengurusan air, input dan output yang sesuai perlu dipilih. Penggunaan output tidak diingini seperti air tidak terhasil (juta liter sehari) jarang diambil perhatian dalam pengukuran kecekapan perkhidmatan bekalan air dan lebih kerap melibatkan input diingini seperti ukur panjang paip (km) dan kos pengendalian (RM ‘000) manakala output yang diingini pula adalah penggunaan air yang dibilkan (juta liter sehari). Oleh yang demikian, model Charnes, Cooper dan Rhodes (CCR) serta model Banker, Charnes dan Cooper (BCC) dalam kaedah Analisis Pengumpulan Data (APD) digunakan untuk menentukan skor kecekapan Unit Pembuatan Keputusan (UPK) iaitu syarikat pengurusan air di setiap negeri dan Wilayah Persekutuan Labuan di Malaysia pada tahun 2015, 2016 dan 2017 sama ada menggunakan output tidak diingini atau tidak. Hasil kajian menunjukkan model BCC dengan output tidak diingini menunjukkan purata skor kecekapan yang lebih tinggi bagi tahun 2015, 2016 dan 2017. Hasil kajian juga menunjukkan syarikat pengurusan air di Johor, Wilayah Persekutuan Labuan, Melaka, Pulau Pinang, Sarawak dan Selangor dapat digunakan sebagai penanda aras untuk mencapai kecekapan dalam pengurusan air

Determination of optimal self-drive tourism route using the orienteering problem method

This paper was conducted to determine the optimal travel routes for self-drive tourism based on the allocation of time and expense by maximizing the amount of attraction scores assigned to each city involved.Self-drive tourism represents a type of tourism where tourists hire or travel by their own vehicle.It only involves a tourist destination which can be linked with a network of roads. Normally, the traveling salesman problem (TSP) and multiple traveling salesman problems (MTSP) method were used in the minimization problem such as determination the shortest time or distance traveled. This paper involved an alternative approach for maximization method which is maximize the attraction scores and tested on tourism data for ten cities in Kedah.A set of priority scores are used to set the attraction score at each city. The classical approach of the orienteering problem was used to determine the optimal travel route. This approach is extended to the team orienteering problem and the two methods were compared. These two models have been solved by using LINGO12.0 software.The results indicate that the model involving the team orienteering problem provides a more appropriate solution compared to the orienteering problem model

Pemodelan penjadualan waktu kursus universiti menggunakan kaedah pengaturcaraan gol

Kajian ini dijalankan untuk membina sebuah model penjadualan waktu kursus universiti yang cekap berdasarkan pemodelanan matematik yang dibangunkan bagi menghasilkan jadual waktu kursus universiti yang optimal dan bebas konflik. Kajian ini dijalankan di Jabatan Sains Pengkomputeran dan Teori, Universiti Islam Antarabangsa Malaysia (UIAM) dengan melibatkan pengumpukan kursus-kursus wajib ke slot masa dan bilik-bilik kuliah. Pendekatan pengaturcaraan gol digunakan untuk membina model tersebut dan diselesaikan menggunakan perisian LINGO 12. Hasil akhir kajian ini menunjukkan model penjadualan waktu kursus yang dicadangkan ini mampu memenuhi kehendak dan kekangan yang telah ditetapkan serta mencapai matlamat untuk mengumpukkan kursus Tahun 4 ke slot masa pagi. Beberapa penambahbaikan turut dilakukan terhadap jadual waktu kursus yang telah sedia ada