Harmony search algorithm for the container storage problem

Recently a new metaheuristic called harmony search was developed. It mimics the behaviors of musicians improvising to find the better state harmony. In this paper, this algorithm is described and applied to solve the container storage problem in the harbor. The objective of this problem is to determine a valid containers arrangement, which meets customers’ delivery deadlines, reduces the number of container rehandlings and minimizes the ship idle time. In this paper, an adaptation of the harmony search algorithm to the container storage problem is detailed and some experimental results are presented and discussed. The proposed approach was compared to a genetic algorithm previously applied to the same problem and recorded a good results.