An Integer Generalized Transportation Model for Optimal Job Assignment in Computer Networks

This paper investigates the assignment of tasks in a network of functionally similar computers. We formulate the problem by a periodic review model with Boolean variables. A computationally efficient, integer-generalized transportation model is applicable because of the existence of relative efficiencies of computers for jobs. Since a job is to be processed exclusively by one computer, we show that an optimal solution to this problem is a basic feasible solution to a slightly modified generalized transportation problem. A branch-and-bound solution procedure prevents possible splitting of a job among computers. We provide an algorithm and computational results.