A New Local Search Algorithm for the Job Shop Scheduling Problem

In this paper, the job shop scheduling problem concerned with minimizing make\|span is discussed, and a new local search algorithm is proposed for it. This local search method is based on an improved shifting bottleneck procedure and Tabu Search technique. This new local search is different from the previous Tabu Search (TS) proposed by other authors, which is because the improved shifting bottleneck procedure is a new technology that is provided by us for the problem, and two remarkable strategies--intensification and diversification of TS are modified. To demonstrate the performance, our algorithm has been tested on many common problem instances (benchmarks) with various sizes and levels of hardness and compared with other algorithms, especially the latest TS in the literatures. Computational experiments show that this algorithm is effective and efficient.