The Design of the Zinc Modelling Language

Marriott, Kim; Nethercote, Nicholas; Rafeh, Reza; Stuckey, Peter J.; Banda, Maria García de la; Wallace, Mark

doi:10.1007/s10601-008-9041-4

Cited by 105 publications

(72 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…The motivation for abstract constraint specification languages, such as Zinc [18] and Essence is to address the modelling bottleneck: the difficulty of formulating a problem of interest as a constraint model suitable for input to a constraint solver. An abstract constraint specification describes a problem above the level at which constraint modelling decisions are made.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatically Generating Streamlined Constraint Models with Essence and Conjure

Wetter

Akgün

Miguel

2015

Lecture Notes in Computer Science

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Abstract. Streamlined constraint reasoning is the addition of uninferred constraints to a constraint model to reduce the search space, while retaining at least one solution. Previously, effective streamlined models have been constructed by hand, requiring an expert to examine closely solutions to small instances of a problem class and identify regularities. We present a system that automatically generates many conjectured regularities for a given Essence specification of a problem class by examining the domains of decision variables present in the problem specification. These conjectures are evaluated independently and in conjunction with one another on a set of instances from the specified class via an automated modelling tool-chain comprising of Conjure, Savile Row and Minion. Once the system has identified effective conjectures they are used to generate streamlined models that allow instances of much larger scale to be solved. Our results demonstrate good models can be identified for problems in combinatorial design, Ramsey theory, graph theory and group theory -often resulting in order of magnitude speed-ups.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatically Generating Streamlined Constraint Models with Essence and Conjure

Wetter

Akgün

Miguel

2015

Lecture Notes in Computer Science

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“…It supports also optimization problems and is the source format used in the MiniZinc Challenge (MZC) [176], which is nowadays the only international competition for evaluating the performances of CP solvers. MiniZinc is a medium-level language that reduces the overall complexity of the higher-level language Zinc [135] by removing user-defined types, various coercions, and user-defined functions. Unlike XCSP,…”

Section: Integer Variablesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Portfolio approaches in constraint programming

Amadini

2015

Constraints

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Recent research has shown that the performance of a single, arbitrarily efficient algorithm can be significantly outperformed by using a portfolio of -possibly onaverage slower-algorithms. Within the Constraint Programming (CP) context, a portfolio solver can be seen as a particular constraint solver that exploits the synergy between the constituent solvers of its portfolio for predicting which is (or which are) the best solver(s) to run for solving a new, unseen instance.In this thesis we examine the benefits of portfolio solvers in CP. Despite portfolio approaches have been extensively studied for Boolean Satisfiability (SAT) problems, in the more general CP field these techniques have been only marginally studied and used. We conducted this work through the investigation, the analysis and the construction of several portfolio approaches for solving both satisfaction and optimization problems. We focused in particular on sequential approaches, i.e., single-threaded portfolio solvers always running on the same core.We started from a first empirical evaluation on portfolio approaches for solving Constraint Satisfaction Problems (CSPs), and then we improved on it by introducing new data, solvers, features, algorithms, and tools. Afterwards, we addressed the more general Constraint Optimization Problems (COPs) by implementing and testing a number of models for dealing with COP portfolio solvers. Finally, we have come full circle by developing sunny-cp: a sequential CP portfolio solver that turned out to be competitive also in the MiniZinc Challenge, the reference competition for CP solvers.iii iv

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“…In the last three decades several languages have been developed for modeling combinatorial optimization problems including OPL [9], ASPEN [8], COMET [10], ESRA [6], ESSENCE [7] and Zinc [11].…”

Section: Related Modeling Languagesmentioning

confidence: 99%

TEMPLE - A domain specific language for modeling and solving staff scheduling problems

Gärtner¹,

Musliu

Schafhauser³

et al. 2011

2011 IEEE Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Scheduling (SCIS)

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Abstract-We present TEMPLE, a domain specific language for modeling and solving staff scheduling problems. TEMPLE provides a set of intuitive abstractions and notations allowing to formulate the constraints of a particular problem in a very compact and natural way. After modeling a staff scheduling problem in TEMPLE, three generic local search algorithms can immediately be applied to the corresponding optimization problem. We show how real-life staff scheduling problems can be both effectively modeled as well as efficiently solved using our approach. Finally, we report on a practical application of TEMPLE in a commercial staff scheduling software.

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The Design of the Zinc Modelling Language

Cited by 105 publications

References 18 publications

Automatically Generating Streamlined Constraint Models with Essence and Conjure

Automatically Generating Streamlined Constraint Models with Essence and Conjure

Portfolio approaches in constraint programming

TEMPLE - A domain specific language for modeling and solving staff scheduling problems

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