We investigate the impact of switching penalties on the nature of optimal scheduling policies for systems of parallel queues without arrivals. We study two types of switching penalties incurred when switching between queues: lump sum costs and time delays. Under the assumption that the service periods of jobs in a given queue possess the same distribution, we derive an index rule that deenes an...

This study proposes a modified version of cultural algorithms (CAs) which benefits from rule-based system for influence function. This rule-based system selects and applies the suitable knowledge source according to the distribution of the solutions. This is important to use appropriate influence function to apply to a specific individual, regarding to its role in the search process. This rule ...

Few if any obtain a measure of success in their chosen profession without the beneficent influence of others. The first author is no exception. His interest in optimal stopping problems was ignited as a student in 1965 when Professor Robbins was visiting the University of Minnesota. Perhaps a fitting way of expressing appreciation would be to use this occasion to introduce the second author, Xi...