Timetable Problem solving

using Graph Coloring

BY,
VENKATESWARA REDDY. TALLAPU REDDY
Outline

 What is Timetable problem..?

 Problem Statement.
 How to construct a graph for this Real-World problem..?
 What is Graph Coloring..?
 How graph coloring can solve this RW problem..?
 Is it NP-hard or not..?
 References.
What is Timetable Problem..?

 Timetable problem can be seen as a form of scheduling where the task is to allocate
activities to available slots within resources respecting some constraints.
 There has been a lot of algorithms developed for this particular problem using different
techniques like Graph Coloring, Tabu Search, Genetic Algorithm, Optimization problem
and so on..
 This is a problem with so many variations due to various constraints that can be tied to it.
Problem Statement.

 Design a simple class schedule with no conflict between a set of teachers and a set of
courses with the following set of constraints:

 1. No same courses can be taken by any teacher or batch for a given time slot.
 2. Minimize the number of time slots required and prove that it is optimum.
How to construct a Graph for this RW
Problem..?

 For example, let us consider 5 courses needed to be scheduled without any conflicts. Then how we can
represent them in a graph is as shown below

 Graph representation
Vertices: represents courses
Edges: represents a pair of courses that conflict, and a
Color: represents the period in which that particular course is to be scheduled.
What is Graph Coloring..?

 Vertex coloring :
It is a way of coloring the vertices of a graph such that no two adjacent vertices share the same color.

 Edge coloring :
An edge-coloring of G is a mapping f : E(G)→S. The element of S are colors; the edges of one color
form a color class. If |S| = k, then f is a k-edge coloring.

 Chromatic Number: χ = least number of colors needed to color a graph.

How graph coloring can solve this RW
problem..?

 Let us consider an example, In a college there are m professors x1, x2, …, xm and n subjects y1, y2, …, yn to be

taught.
 Given that professor xi is required to teach subject yj for pij periods.
 Construct a bipartite multigraph G with vertices x1, x2, …, xm, and  y1, y2, …, yn such that vertices xi and yj are
connected by pij edges.
 Initially consider a single period. The timetable for this single period corresponds to a matching in the graph
and, conversely, each matching corresponds to a possible assignment of professors to subjects taught during
this period.
 Thus, the solution to the timetabling problem consists of partitioning the edges of G into the minimum
number of matching's. Equivalently, we must properly color the edges of G with the minimum number of
colors.
Contd….

 We shall show yet another way of solving the problem using the vertex coloring
algorithm.
 Recall that the line graph L(G) of G has as vertices the edges of G and two vertices
in L(G) are connected by an edge if and only if the corresponding edges in G have a
vertex in common.
 The line graph L(G) is a simple graph and a proper vertex coloring of L(G) yields a proper
edge coloring of G using the same number of colors.
 Thus, to solve the timetabling problem, it needs to find a minimum proper vertex coloring
of L(G).We demonstrate the solution with a small example. 
Suppose there are four professors x1, x2, x3, x4 and five subjects y1, y2, y3, y4, y5 to be taught.
The teaching requirement matrix p = [ pij ] is as shown:

p y1 y2 y3 y4 y5

x1 2 0 1 1 0

x2 0 1 0 1 0

x3 0 1 1 1 0

x4 0 0 0 1 1

The bipartite multi graph G

Vertex Coloring: 
(1, green), (2, red), (3, blue), (4, yellow), (5, yellow), (6, green), (7, green), (8, yellow), (9, red), (10,
blue), (11, yellow).

This, in turn, yields a minimum proper vertex 4-coloring of the bipartite multigraph G: 
 
3
2
4

11

10

7
8 9
Edge Coloring: 
({x1, y1}, green), ({x1, y1}, red), ({x1, y3}, blue), ({x1, y4}, yellow),
({x2, y2}, yellow), ({x2, y4}, green),
({x3, y2}, green), ({x3, y3}, yellow), ({x3, y4}, red),
({x4, y4}, blue), ({x4, y5}, yellow).

Then, from the edge coloring of G, we obtain a solution of the given timetabling problem as shown below:

- 1 2 3 4

x1 y1 y1 y3 y4
x2 y4 - - y2
x3 y2 y4 - y3
x4 - - y4 y5

Consider green, red, blue, yellow as periods 1, 2, 3, 4 respectively.

Contd..
Is it NP-hard or not..?

 Timetable problem solving has many variations due to various constraints that can be tied
to it.

 That is why it is so hard and is considered as NP(Non-Polynomial) complete.

 i.e. it does not have any polynomial time bound. However, approximate algorithm or
heuristic approach can be taken to attain solution in a feasible time bound
References.

 http://www.iro.umontreal.ca/~hahn/IFT3545/GTWA.pdf
 http://www.hoonzis.com/applications-of-graph-theory/
 http://www.cs.xu.edu/csci390/12s/IJEST10-02-09-124.pdf