Interactive Course Timetabling

Timetabling problems are often solved based upon what is assumed to be complete information about the problem. However, users may later desire modifications to the generated timetable to adapt to changing requirements or increase their personal satisfaction with the solution [1,5,3]. Methods that allow corrections to an existing timetable while leaving most of the solution intact are necessary. Furthermore, the ability to make interactive changes to a timetable introduces a desirable approach by allowing users to readily react to a limited set of altered requirements by choosing among appropriate options. The aim of this paper is to introduce such methods of interactive timetabling as they have been applied at Purdue University. The concept of using interactive timetabling in this problem has been described previously [4], however, this work introduces a new formal view of this approach.