Test driven software engineering for automated course scheduler

Abstract

Software for solving these problems. The scheduling problems are essentially the problems that deal with effective distribution of resources. During the scheduling process many constraints have to be considered. Resources are usually limited for most of the scheduling problems it has been shown that they are NP-hard, and that they can not be solved in polynomial time using a deterministic algorithm.

Scheduling a timetable could also be represented like special class of 3D cutting problems. The timetable could be presented as a 3D structure. The dimensions of 3D timetables are: days (xaxis), timeslots (y-axis) and rooms (z-axis). The classes are shown as cubes, which should be placed in a 3D timetable structure. The scheduling is a process of placing those cubes into a timetable, in the way that no conflicting classes (which allocate the same resource, a student group or an instructor) are placed in the same time slot. The BUACS (BRAC University Automated Course Scheduler) is a specialized program that can also be modified to be used as a generic Time-Table Generator to produce timetable output for a certain set of applicable system constraint. The basic requirement is to place the inputted courses in a time by room table maintaining the pre-defined constraint list for each of the courses. The document will explain the detail requirement and underlying system architecture to achieve the primary goal.