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This paper addresses the mixed no-idle flowshop scheduling problem with flowtime minimization. In a mixed no-idle environment, machines are set in series and some machines do not allow idleness and require continuous processing. We approached a variant of this problem that analyses the total flowtime minimization criterion. As this is a new problem, novel high-performance heuristics and metaheuristics were presented. In order to assess the proposed algorithms, we evaluated well-known heuristics and metaheuristics from similar scheduling problems. Furthermore, we developed a speed-up procedure to increase the efficiency of the proposed methods. The presented algorithms were exhaustively tested in a well-known large benchmark with 1750 problem instances. Our results indicate that the novel heuristics and metaheuristics are computationally efficient and obtain high-quality solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mixed no-idle flowshop scheduling problem arises in modern industries including integrated circuits, ceramic frit and steel production, among others, and where some machines are not allowed to remain idle between jobs. This paper describes an exact algorithm that uses Benders decomposition with a simple yet effective enhancement mechanism that entails the generation of additional cuts by using a referenced local search to help speed up convergence. Using only a single additional optimality cut at each iteration, and combined with combinatorial cuts, the algorithm can optimally solve instances with up to 500 jobs and 15 machines that are otherwise not within the reach of off-the-shelf optimization software, and can easily surpass ad-hoc existing metaheuristics. To the best of the authors' knowledge, the algorithm described here is the only exact method for solving the mixed no-idle permutation flowshop scheduling problem. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we study the distributed assembly mixed no-idle permutation flowshop scheduling problem (DAMNIPFSP) with total tardiness objective. We first formulate the problem. Second, based on the characteristics of the DAMNIPFSP, an improved Iterated Greedy algorithm, named RIG (Referenced Iterated Greedy), with two novel destruction methods, four new reconstruction methods and six new local search methods is presented. Among them, two of the reconstruction methods and four of the local search methods are based on a reference, which proves key to performance. Finally, RIG is compared with the related algorithms through experiments. The results show that the new RIG algorithm is a new state-of-the-art procedure for the DAMNIPFSP with the total tardiness criterion. • We study a distributed assembly mixed no-idle permutation flowshop scheduling. • A mixed-integer linear programming model is presented. • A Referenced Iterated greedy (RIG) algorithm is proposed. • Experimental results show that the effectiveness of our algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]