A multinational company uses a personal computer to schedule a fleet of coastal tankers and barges transporting liquid bulk products among plants, distribution centres (tank farms), and industrial customers. A simple spreadsheet interface cloaks a sophisticated optimization-based decision support system and makes this system useable via a variety of natural languages. The dispatchers, whose native language is not English, and some of whom presumably speak no English at all, communicate via the spreadsheet, and view recommended schedules displayed in Gantt charts-both internationally familiar tools. Inside the spreadsheet, a highly detailed simulation can generate every feasible alternate vessel employment schedule, and an integer linear set partitioning model selects one schedule for each vessel so that all loads and deliveries are completed at minimal cost while satisfying all operational requirements. The optimized fleet employment schedule is displayed graphically with hourly time resolution over a planning horizon of 2-3 weeks. Each vessel will customarily make several voyages and many port calls to load and unload products during this time.

Naval Postgral1uatc ScI/l)ol MOllterey, Clllifom iQ 93943 DAVID RONE N School of 8 11 5;lIl'% Administration Ulliversity of Missouri-St. LOll is 8001 Nat ural Rridge Road St. [.oll is, Missouri 63121 typ e , The ca nd ida te sc hed ules ma y include (lube) products at Mubil Oil Co rpor a tion. The sys te m cons o lid ates deliveries automaticall y o r with dispatcher assistance, creating a lar ge se t of promisin g cand id ate sched ules cos ted for eac h available tru ck A computer-as sisted sys te m consolidates and di spatches tru ck shi pments of pa ckaged and bulk lu brican t Mobil Oil Corpo rat ion consolidates and dispatches tru ck shipments of heavy petroleum prod ucts-lubricants in pa ckages and in bul k-from 10 lubricant plants nationwid e. It disp at ches hundred s of orde rs daily eithe r ind ividu ally or as consolida ted tru ckloads, usin g a very nonhom ogen eous fl eet of Mobi lcontro lled and cont rac t vehicles and commo n carriers. Shipmen t sche d ules may span severa l da ys and include stops to pick up return ed drums or entire trailers. Shipping costs depend upon th e vehicle used , th e shipme nt size, th e location s of th e stops, and th e route distance and time. Ca ndida te consolidations are ge ne ra ted autom ati cally or with disp at cher ass istance. The n, th e dispatcher uses optimization to select a minima l-cost set of sche d ules. Mo bil has been usin g thi s sys tem for three yea rs, redu cing ann ua l transportation costs by abo ut $ 1 million (US). Sta nd not upon the o rder of your gotng. But go < I t onn'.-Sha kl'spl' a rl•, Macbeth

The ability to rapidly mobilize the Marine Corps in times of crisis is a cornerstone of Unit ed States defense stra tegy. To mobilize rapidly, the marines need an efficient system for assigning officers to mobilization billets. The sys tem we designed and built is based on a network optimization algorithm that works in conjunction with carefully designed and scrupulously maintained Marine Corps data bases. It takes less than 10 minutes on a 386-based personal computer to complete a mobilization involving 40,000 officers and 27,000 billets and to produce output suitable for generating orders to report via MAILGRAM. Prior to our work, the Marine Corps had a mainframe-based system that took two to four days to complete a mobilization. The new system is not only much faster than the old system, but it also produces significantly better assignments with respect to all measures of effectiveness considered. You 'll find us rough, sir, but you'll find us ready.-Charles Dickens. David Copperfield A lmost all of the United States' contingen cy plan s for responding with force to international crises invo lve rapid deploymen t of the marin es in the earliest Copynghf Cl I~I. Tbe Inst1tutl' o f M.n.gl'mml Soences OO~I •2102 /91 /2 104 / 0026S0L2 5 Thls P<1P" wu refereed ph ases of action. The marines may be called upon to seize an d hold a stra tegic geograp hic location or to negate a specific ene my asset. The exact mission will depend on the nature of the crisis. but in any case , it is essential for national security MIUTARY Al'rUCATI O NS-MANPOWER O PTIMIZATION-N ETWO RKS

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