JPH06325046A - Scheduling system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To enable desired editing processing for a production schedule. CONSTITUTION:The planning factors of the production schedule prepared on set conditions are structured corresponding to an object direction provided with real constitution (instance) and a procedure (method) for processing this constitution. In this method, a message sending function for transferring a message between the related planning factors when editing such as move is instructed and a demon function for specifying the operation of the factor itself in that case are mounted. Further, a display color for each line, each factor or each production phase and conditions for the various kinds of display or the like are specified as well. Therefore, the processing leveling the movement of planning factors or the total number of products to be produced less than the upper limit can be efficiently performed at high speed.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a scheduling system for supporting production planning when various products or models are produced in a factory.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the case of producing a predetermined product or model in a factory, it is necessary to decide a production schedule, but in the past, the product or model to be produced, the production amount, delivery date, inventory of parts, It was created manually in consideration of the production capacity of the production line and the personnel required for the production line.

However, since it takes a great deal of skill to make a production plan, it is not easy for anyone to do, and even a skilled person requires a great deal of time.

Therefore, in recent years, it has been proposed to determine the schedule by inferring it by using an expert system using a predetermined scheduling rule (for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2-165340 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Sho-165340). 59-37033).

[0005]

However, the above-mentioned expert system is not only expensive, but also requires a special engineer to operate it.

When this is applied to a production plan, the scheduling rule becomes complicated and huge,
It is impractical because it takes a long time to get a solution to the schedule, and the maintenance of the scheduling rules is very troublesome.

Further, in the conventional system, there is a problem that only a part of the produced production plan cannot be modified. This is a very important issue. That is, the produced production plan is generally satisfactory, but only a part of it needs to be corrected due to various circumstances such as the production line, the availability of personnel who can be arranged, and the arrangement of parts. The situation may occur. In such a case, the conventional expert system cannot modify only a part, so the scheduling rule must be rewritten and the process must be performed from the beginning, which is not only troublesome to modify the scheduling rule, but also the production. The problem is that it takes a very long time to create a plan.

Furthermore, it is desirable that the created schedule can be examined from various viewpoints from various viewpoints. However, since the schedule created by the conventional system has only numerical data listed, It was very difficult to easily judge the mutual relation of various constraints regarding scheduling.

For example, considering the case of producing a product,
Usually, constraints such as priority of production, time, and production amount are set. Therefore, as a schedule, which product, in what order, when, and how many units will be produced are determined, but the viewpoint of considering this schedule varies depending on the position. In other words, the relationship between time and production volume is the most important factor in the actual production factory.
From the point of view of a sales person, paying attention to the relationship between priority and time when a high-priority product is produced, and who is in the position of managing the parts for producing the product, We pay attention to the relationship between priority and production in order to know how much time and how easy it should be.

However, it is very difficult to study from various viewpoints in this way with the schedule created by the conventional system.

The present invention is intended to solve the above problems, and anyone can easily obtain a schedule in a short time, and the mutual relation of schedule constraints can be easily and clearly defined. The purpose is to provide a scheduling system that can be grasped.

[0012]

In order to achieve the above object, the scheduling system of the present invention is a scheduling system in which elements to be scheduled are arranged in a multidimensional space defined by a limiting condition relating to scheduling. , The elements arranged in the multidimensional space are grouped for each axis of the multidimensional space to be a planning element, and each of the planning elements has a structure including an instance and a method for processing the planning element. .

[0013]

The elements to be scheduled are arranged in the multidimensional space defined by the restriction condition regarding the scheduling, and these elements are collectively arranged as a planning element for each axis of the multidimensional space. Then, this plan element has a structure in which an instance and a method for processing the instance are set.

As a result, the created schedule can be displayed or printed out from various viewpoints, and desired editing can be performed for each planning element.

[0015]

Embodiments will be described below with reference to the drawings.
In the following embodiments, the case where the scheduling system according to the present invention is applied to the production planning is described, but it is needless to say that it is generally applicable to other scheduling.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of the scheduling system according to the present invention. In the figure, 1 is an input means, 2 is a display means, 3 is a planning engine, and 4 is a data model.

In FIG. 1, the input means 1 comprises a pointing device such as a mouse and a keyboard. A mouse is used as the pointing device here. Display means 2 is color C
It is composed of a display device such as an RT.

The planning engine 3 schedules a production plan based on various constraints set by the input means 1, and is composed of a microprocessor and its peripheral circuits.

The data model 4 is for storing the data of the schedule of the production plan obtained by the planning engine 3. The structure of this data model will be described later.

In FIG. 1, the scheduling system is described as a so-called stand-alone device, but it can be connected to a database or the like through an appropriate network, and an output means such as a printer is provided. Although it is also possible, it is omitted because it is not related to the essence of the present invention.

Next, the operation of the planning engine 3 will be described. First, the process of obtaining the entire production plan based on the required conditions will be described.

Now, in producing the four elements A, B, C and D, if there is a demand as shown in FIG.
The operator inputs this data from the input means 1. In addition, an element means a product here. In addition, in FIG. 2, when the unit of time is day, the start means the production start date, the end means the production end date, the period means the production days, the quantity means the production quantity per day, and the line means the production line.

Therefore, according to FIG. 2, it is required that the element A is produced using the production line "2" for a total of four vehicles within two days from the production start date, and the element B is produced.
It can be seen that it is required to produce two units in one day using the production line "2". Other elements C, D
Is also the same. Note that the unit of time is not limited to days, and it may be an hour, a minute, or the like, and it goes without saying that it can be arbitrarily adopted.

Now, here, 3 of time, line and quantity is used.
Since there are two constraints, this production plan is applied to the three-dimensional space as shown in FIG.
Projecting the plane at 2 into a two-dimensional space of time and quantity,
There are two two-dimensional spaces, a two-dimensional space showing the relationship between time and quantity at line = 1 and a two-dimensional space showing the relationship between time and quantity at line = 2. This allows the three-dimensional space to be processed in the two-dimensional space.

Next, the time axis and quantity axis of each of the two two-dimensional spaces showing the relationship between time and quantity are quantized. The time axis can be quantized in units of time, in this case days, and its length should be slightly larger than the required number of days. This can be determined, for example, by adding a predetermined value to the maximum value of the request period shown in FIG. Here, 3 is added to the maximum value of the required period.

The quantity axis is quantized by the number of units produced, and its length is the total number of units that can be produced per unit time on all the lines used, in this case, the total number of units that can be produced in one day. do it. Here, it is assumed that the total is 5. Note that the maximum daily production number of each line may be input by the operator, or may be stored in the planning engine 3 in advance.

As a result, in this case, each two-dimensional space becomes a 5 × 5 matrix, and next, an address is assigned to each block of the two two-dimensional space matrices. Normally, when an address is attached to a two-dimensional matrix, the address is attached in the form of (X, Y) using the X coordinate and the Y coordinate in most cases, but such an address is added to the processing. In this case, processing must always be performed for two values of X and Y, which is an obstacle to speeding up.

Therefore, addresses are given to the blocks of the two two-dimensional matrices by serial numbers from 0 to 49. This is shown in FIG. FIG. 4A shows the relationship between time and quantity in line 1, and FIG. 4B shows the relationship between time and quantity in line 2. In both cases, the time axis is 5 days and the quantity axis is 5 units. Addresses 0 to 24 are assigned to the matrix of line 1 and addresses 25 to 49 are assigned to the matrix of line 2.

Next, these two matrices are combined and expanded to form a table of one row or one column with addresses 0 to 49 as shown in FIG. This means that the two-dimensional space has been converted into the one-dimensional space, and the three-dimensional space is finally converted into the one-dimensional space, so that the planning process can be performed at high speed.

Although the concept of the method for finally making the multidimensional space one-dimensional has been described above, the planning engine 3 is immediately shown in FIG. 5 when the request shown in FIG. 2 is given based on the above-mentioned method. The one-dimensional table shown is created. Here, the planning engine 3 operates as shown in FIG.
It is natural to know which address in the dimension table corresponds to which position in the two-dimensional matrix of which line. Note that the planning engine 3 performs all the processing by using the one-dimensional table shown in FIG. 5, but here, in order to facilitate understanding, in the following description, as shown in FIG. 4 as necessary. A two-dimensional matrix will be used for explanation.

As described above, when the one-dimensional table is created, the planning engine 3 then enters the planning process of actually designing how many elements on which day and at what time. Constraints are required. This is as follows. As mentioned above, even if the total number of the maximum number that can be produced in one day of line 1 and line 2 is 5,
Depending on the availability of personnel or parts that can be placed on these production lines, these production lines may not always be fully operational. Therefore, there are restrictions on each manufacturing line. Here, it is assumed that there is a constraint as shown in FIG. According to FIG. 6, the line 1 can be operated only for 3 days, and there is a constraint that 3 units can be manufactured per day. Therefore, the shaded portion shown in FIG. 7A cannot be used for the line 1, and similarly for the line 2 shown in FIG.
The shaded area of B becomes unusable. The constraint condition of this line is input in advance by the operator.

Therefore, the planning engine 3 operates as shown in FIG.
A predetermined value meaning invalid is written in the address corresponding to the shaded block in FIGS. 7A and 7B of the dimension table.

In this state, the planning engine 3 executes the planning process. FIG. 8 is a diagram showing an example of the planning process, and if there is an element that has not been arranged yet, the element is selected (step S2). in this case,
Since all four elements A, B, C, D are not arranged, the planning engine 3 first selects the element A, and then selects the line of the element A selected from the request shown in FIG. 2 (step S3). ).

The selection of the line in step S3 is the process of selecting the address area of the one-dimensional table. In this case, the line of the element A is the line 2, so the planning engine 3 can be said to be the matrix of FIG. 7B. For example, select the address of the block that is not shaded.

Next, whether or not the start date of the selected address is free, in this case, since it is required that the element A is produced from the first day, some data is already stored in the address 25. Is written (step S4), and if it is empty, the pattern of this element A is selected (step S5).

This pattern is as follows.
Here, since it is required that two element A's be produced on each of the first and second days, according to this requirement, it is desirable that the element A be produced in the pattern shown in FIG. 9A. . 9A, 9B, 9C and 9D, the number of horizontal blocks indicates the day, and the number of vertical blocks indicates the number of units produced. However, there is a possibility that the pattern shown in FIG. 9A cannot always be produced due to various factors such as the relationship with other elements. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 9B, 1
A pattern in which four vehicles are produced per day or a pattern in which one vehicle is produced per day for four days as shown in FIG. 9C is also targeted for processing. However, as a pattern of this production, only those which become rectangular as a whole when the blocks are arranged as shown in FIGS.
The pattern as shown in FIG. 9D is not targeted. This is because if such a pattern is used as a target, the number of cases will be very large, the processing will take much time, and a supplementary effect cannot be expected. The same applies to other elements. However, line 1
When arranging the elements C and D to be produced in, it is natural that the area of the address not shaded in FIG. 7A is selected.

The planning engine 3 first selects the pattern shown in FIG. 9A so as to satisfy the input request, and determines whether this pattern can be arranged (step S6). The meaning of this process is as follows. Although it is confirmed that the address 25 is vacant by the judgment in step S4, in order to arrange the pattern shown in FIG. 9A, not only the address 25 but also the addresses 26, 30,
31 must also be free. For example, address 30
It will be apparent that the pattern of FIG. 9A cannot be placed in this position if other elements have already been placed in.

That is, in order to arrange the selected pattern, all the addresses corresponding to the pattern need to be free, and it is determined in step S.
It is 6. Therefore, for example, in step S5 in FIG.
If the pattern shown in is selected, the planning engine 3 determines in step S6 the address 2 of the one-dimensional table.
It will be determined whether or not 5, 30, 35 and 40 are vacant.

If all the addresses in which the selected pattern is to be arranged are vacant according to the judgment in step S6, the planning engine 3 arranges this pattern (step S7). Therefore, in this case, the element A is arranged at the addresses 25, 26, 30, 31 of FIG. 7B, but in the actual processing, it is arranged at the addresses 25, 26, 30, 31 of the one-dimensional table of FIG. A is written.

The planning engine 3 executes the above processing for all the elements, but if there is no vacancy on the production start date required in the judgment of step S4, it is checked whether there is any vacancy on the previous day. It is determined (step S8).
Then, if there is a free space, the process from step S5 onward is executed. If there is no free space, it is judged whether or not there is a free space on the previous day. If there is no free space, error processing is executed. A message indicating that the element cannot be arranged is displayed on the display unit 2.

Although it is determined in step S8 whether or not the day before the production start date is free, this can be achieved in time for delivery if the pattern is produced in the pattern shown in FIG. 9A or 9B, but it is shown in FIG. 9C. This is because it is possible that the pattern production will not be in time, and if it is in time for delivery, it is of course possible to judge whether or not the next day of the production start date is free.

If the pattern selected in step S6 cannot be arranged, the process returns to step S5 to select the next pattern. However, if all the patterns to be processed cannot be arranged. For example, the same error processing as in step S9 may be performed to display a message indicating that the element cannot be placed, or the previously placed element may be canceled and the processing for placing this element may be performed, and then canceled. You may make it process the arrangement | positioning of the element. However, if it cannot be arranged in any way, the above error processing is performed.

As described above, in this scheduling system, when arranging the elements, that is, scheduling the production, the multidimensional space having various constraints is finally converted into the one-dimensional space, so that the processing can be performed at high speed. Can be done. Moreover, since the scheduling rule is not used in the scheduling process unlike the conventional system, anyone can easily operate.

Now, it is assumed that a solution as shown in FIG. 10 is obtained by the above-mentioned arrangement processing. According to FIG. 10, line 1 produced one each of element C on the second and third days, produced one element D on the second day, and line 2 produced one on the first and second days. It has been decided to produce two element A each for each eye and two element B for each third day.

By the way, as described above, the planning engine 3 performs the process of creating a schedule on the one-dimensional table.
It is necessary to return to the dimensional space. However, the solution obtained is
It is not a good idea to display in three dimensions as shown in. Because the three-dimensional display as shown in FIG. 3 is very difficult to see, it is difficult to clearly understand the relationship between the axes, and the schedule of the production plan is displayed on the display means 2. Alternatively, even if it is output as a hard copy by a printer (not shown in FIG. 1), a two-dimensional display is unavoidable. Further, as described above, since the production planning schedule needs to be examined from various viewpoints, it is necessary to display not only the overall relationship between time and quantity and line, but also the relationship between time and quantity alone.

Therefore, the planning engine 3 collects the elements for each axis of the three-dimensional space and creates a planning element based on the obtained solution. Therefore, in this case, the planned element is a collection of the number of products produced for each element for each day and each line. Although any structure may be adopted as the data structure of the plan element, here, the plan element is used as an object, and an object-oriented concept in which an actual configuration (instance) and a procedure (method) are set is set. It has a conforming structure.

As the instance, for example, an element name,
Data such as the production start date, the final delivery date, the number of products produced per day, the number of products that can be produced per day, and the customer name are written. As a method, for example, a message sending function for exchanging messages between planning elements related to some kind of editing instruction, a moving function, and a daemon function that regulates its own operation in that case are installed. ing. Further, display colors for each line, each element, each production phase, various display modes, and the like are also defined. In addition, what kind of method is specifically defined will be sequentially described below. Further, since the message sending function and the daemon function are well known, detailed description will be omitted. Then, the planning element having the above-described structure is stored in the data model 4.

Next, the display of the produced production schedule will be described. When the input means 1 gives an instruction to display a screen showing all the relationships among time, line, and quantity (hereinafter, referred to as a first display mode), the planning engine 3 causes the plan relating to the schedule. Element first
The screen is displayed according to the display mode. An example thereof is shown in FIG. FIG. 11 is a diagram showing a display example of the solution shown in FIG.
At the top, the time unit, in this case, the day, is displayed. Below that, the planning element of line 1 is displayed, and below that, the planning element of line 2 is displayed.

Here, each block represents one planning element, and the planning element vertically shown as "C1" indicates that one element C is produced. Therefore, the operator finds that the schedule of the first day does not produce the line A on the line 1, but the line 2 produces two elements A, and the second day produces the elements C and D on the line 1 by 1 respectively. It can be easily confirmed that two elements A are produced on the line 2 by producing them one by one. The same applies to the second and third days.

As described above, according to such a screen, it is possible to easily and clearly grasp all the relations among the three constraint condition axes of time, line, and quantity relating to the production plan. That is, by using the planning element described above, it becomes possible to clearly and two-dimensionally display all the relationships of the three constraint condition axes of time, line, and quantity. Naturally, each plan element is displayed in the color defined by the method.

The method of each planning element has the first
It is stipulated that when the mouse is specified in the display mode, the instance is displayed. Therefore, by designating a desired planning element with the mouse on the screen shown in FIG. 11, an instance of the planning element can be displayed.

For example, when the planning element indicated by 10 in the drawing is designated by the mouse in the state where the display of FIG. 11 is made, an instance of this planning element 10 is displayed in a window as shown in FIG. 12, for example. In FIG.
Product is the element name, start date (St
(art date) is the production start date, End date is the final delivery date, Load per day is the number of vehicles produced per day, Total load is the number of vehicles that can be produced per day, Customer (Customer) ) Indicates a customer name. With such a display, the operator can confirm the specific contents of each planning element.

By the way, although the obtained schedule is generally satisfactory, there is a case where it is inevitable that only a part of the schedule should be corrected due to the inventory of parts or the personnel who can arrange the parts. Therefore, this scheduling system is equipped with an editing function that can correct only a part of the created schedule within the range.

In such a case, the operator first sets the area to be corrected. For example, it is assumed that the production schedule as shown in FIG. 13 is displayed on the screen of the display means 2. According to FIG. 13, the elements A, B, C and D are produced on the lines 2, 3, 4, and 1 on the schedule shown in the figure. When it is desired to correct the schedules of the 6th to 9th days for the line 2 and the line 3 in the production schedule, the operator sets a rectangular area as indicated by 11 in the figure. This rectangular area may be set, for example, by pointing the diagonal vertices of the rectangle with a mouse.

Then, the operator then gives an instruction to start the processing of the schedule. As a method of giving this instruction, the input means 1 may be provided with a key for editing. Here, this key is provided on the mouse.

When the edit key is pressed, the planning engine 3 displays the edit menu on the screen of the display means 2. FIG. 14 is a diagram showing a display example of the edit menu,
Various menus for editing are displayed in a window.
When the "schedule" is instructed on this screen, the planning engine 3 starts the element rearrangement process only within this area 11.

At this time, the planning engine 3 first
The planning elements that are all included in the set area 11 are extracted. In this case, three planning elements 12, 13, and 14 in the figure are extracted, and the planning elements 15 and 16 are not extracted because all of them are not included in the area 11. The planning engine 3 recognizes in which range on the screen all of the displayed planning elements are displayed, and at what position the rectangular area 11 is set. Therefore, the process of extracting the planning element can be easily performed.

Next, the extracted planning elements 12, 13, 1
Since 4 is related to line 2 and line 3, a two-dimensional matrix similar to that shown in FIG. 7 can be created for line 2 and line 3. In this case, since the number of days cut out in the area 11 is four days, the horizontal axis of the two-dimensional matrix is four days, but in the vertical axis, that is, in this case, the number of producible vehicles in line 2 and line 3 The total may be input by the operator. It should be noted that although extra days were taken in the processing of the first scheduling described above,
In this case, the number of days is fixed, so that only the number of days should be taken.

Now, assuming that the total number of vehicles that can be produced on the lines 2 and 3 is set to 7, both two two-dimensional matrices have a size of 4 (horizontal) × 7 (vertical), Next, as shown in FIGS. 15A and 15B, serial numbers from 0 to 55 are assigned as addresses to the blocks of these two-dimensional matrices. Here, FIG. 15A is a two-dimensional matrix for line 2, and FIG. 15B is a two-dimensional matrix for line 3.

Then, combining these two matrices,
When expanded, a one-dimensional table with addresses 0 to 55 is obtained as shown in FIG. That is, when the execution of the rearrangement process is instructed, the planning engine 3 immediately creates a one-dimensional table as shown in FIG. 16 based on the information of the extracted range and the input condition,
The rearrangement process is executed using this one-dimensional table.

When the planning engine 3 creates the one-dimensional table shown in FIG. 16, the planning engine 3 then writes a predetermined value meaning invalid to an unusable address due to the same line constraint condition as shown in FIG. The constraint condition of this line is input in advance by the operator. For example, when it is set that the shaded portion in FIG. 17 cannot be used due to the line constraint condition, the planning engine 3 causes the one-dimensional table to indicate that the address corresponding to the shaded portion in FIG. Write the value.

Next, the plan-making engine 3 decomposes the extracted plan elements 12, 13, and 14 into each element and executes the processing shown in FIG. 8 to rearrange the elements. At this time, each planning element is treated as a separate one. For example, according to FIG. 13, the planning elements 12 and 13 are both related to the element A, but the planning element 12 and the planning element 13 are treated as separate elements in this rearrangement process.
Therefore, regarding the planning element 12, there are two patterns shown in FIGS. 18A and 18B as the production patterns selected in step S5 of FIG. 8, and as the production patterns of the planning element 13 are FIGS. 19A, B, C and D. There are four patterns.

Since the processing of FIG. 8 has been described above, it will not be repeated here to avoid duplication. However, when the planning engine 3 obtains a solution of the arrangement of elements by the processing of FIG. 8, the planning element is calculated based on the solution. It is created, the plan element is applied to the set area 11, and the whole production plan is stored in the data model 4.

However, such a solution is not always one. Therefore, in this case, the planning engine 3 applies various production patterns for each planning element, finds all the required solutions, creates the planning element in that case, fits it in the set area, and Store in 4. As a result, all solutions of the rearrangement are stored in the data model 4.

Therefore, in this case, with respect to the line 2, for example, as shown in FIG. 20A, a solution of producing four units each for two days on the sixth day and the seventh day, or FIG.
As shown in 0B, 2 on each of the 6th to 9th days
A plurality of solutions can be obtained, such as a solution for producing each one, or a solution for producing three each on the sixth and seventh days and producing two on the eighth day as shown in FIG. 20C. Similarly, line 3
For example, a solution as shown in FIGS. 21A and 21B is obtained.

When the rearrangement process only within the desired area is completed as described above, the operator next selects one from the obtained solutions. At this time, first the solution is instructed to be displayed. As a result, one solution is displayed on the display means 2. Now, assume that the solution as shown in FIG. 22 is displayed. This is a combination of the solution shown in FIG. 20A and the solution shown in FIG. 21A. If this is satisfactory, the operator presses the edit key of the mouse in this state to display the edit menu shown in FIG. 14 and selects "Choose".

As a result, a submenu as shown in FIG. 23 is displayed on the screen as a window. Then, in this submenu, select "pickup" to determine the production plan. When the pickup menu is selected, the data model 4 registers the schedule currently displayed on the screen as the official production schedule.

However, if the displayed schedule is not satisfactory, from the submenu of FIG. 23, the menu for displaying the next solution is "forward" or the previous one. "Backward (backwar
The solutions obtained by appropriately operating "d)" are displayed one after another, and a satisfactory one can be selected from the pickup menu.

The "schedule" and "chews" of the edit menu shown in FIG. 14 have been described above. The other edit menus will be described below.
“Cut” is a menu for deleting a planning element. For example, if the planning element 16 is instructed on the screen shown in FIG. 13 and “Cut” is selected from the edit menu, all the data relating to this planning element 16 is deleted. , Is also erased from the screen. That is, the method of each planning element specifies that when the "cut" is selected by instructing on the screen, the self-data is deleted. It should be noted that the method may be specified to be displayed in reverse when it is instructed on the screen, which makes it possible to clearly understand on the screen which planning element is instructed.

However, since "cut" also erases the data of the planning element, if "cut" is mistakenly selected, it cannot be recovered. Therefore, there is also provided a "paste" for deleting the instructed planning element from the screen but temporarily saving the data. Therefore, in the method of each planning element, it is stipulated that when "paste" is selected on the screen and its data is temporarily saved, it is deleted from the screen.

"Undo" is an editing process that cancels the previously performed process and restores the state immediately before the process is performed. Therefore, "undo" is selected for the method of each planning element. If it does, it is stipulated to return to the state immediately before the previous processing was performed.

"Condition" is a menu for setting various conditions when performing the scheduling process of the production plan or when performing the rearrangement process of only a part. Then, when "condition" is selected, a submenu as shown in FIG. 24 is displayed in a window. In FIG. 24, “Load” is a menu for setting the load of the manufacturing line, “Period” is a menu for setting the period, and “Priority” is set.
y) ”is a menu for setting the priority order. What is used as the priority order is arbitrary, but here, the manufacturing line number indicates the priority order as it is. Therefore, although omitted in the above description, the above-described line constraint conditions and the like are input using this menu.

Further, in FIG. 14, "date"
Is a menu for setting the display unit. Then, when this "date" is selected, a sub menu as shown in FIG. 25 is displayed in a window. In FIG. 25, “year”, “month”, and “day” each have a production plan schedule of 1
It is a menu for displaying by year, month, and day. Therefore, if you want to display by month,
Select "Month" in the submenu of 5.

The edit menu has been described above.
In this scheduling system, each plan element defines a movement of a position as a method and an operation when another plan element interrupts its own position due to movement, so it is provided as an edit menu. No, but the desired planning element can be moved to the desired location.

For example, when the screen of FIG. 26 is displayed, it is assumed that there is a case where it is desired to move the planning element 20 between the planning element 21 and the planning element 22 due to various factors. In this case, the operator moves the planning element 20 between the planning element 21 and the planning element 22 while pointing the planning element 20 with the mouse. As a result, planning element 20 and planning element 21
A message to move is exchanged between and. Then, for example, when it is specified that the method shifts by one day when a plan element whose priority is lower than its own is interrupted by the method, the plan element 20 is the line 3 and the plan element 21 is the line 4 here. Since the priority is lower than that of the line 3, the planning element 21 is automatically deviated by one day, and the planning element 20 is located at the empty position. At this time, the planning element 21 exchanges a message to the effect that the planning element 22 will move. In this case, since the plan elements 21 and 22 have the same priority, the plan element 22 is automatically deviated by one day, and the plan element 21 is located at the vacant place, and as shown in FIG. The schedule will be obtained.

Although the contents of the instance change with the movement, the instance after the movement has the planning engine 3
All planning elements moved from are notified. This will update the instance of each planning element.

As described above, in this scheduling system, the planning elements can be appropriately moved, and the related planning elements are automatically changed in position by the operation specified by the method, and Since the instance is also updated automatically, you can easily change the schedule.

According to the first display mode, the situation of the entire schedule such as time, quantity, and line and the relationship between quantity and line can be clearly understood, but the relationship between time and quantity is not always clear. For example, in FIG. 27, the number of units to be produced in total on the 7th day is troublesome because the number of vehicles described in the planning elements arranged on the 7th day must be summed up.

Therefore, a display mode showing only the relationship between time and quantity (hereinafter referred to as the second display mode) is prepared. It goes without saying that the second display mode can be displayed alone on the screen, but the second display mode can also be displayed simultaneously with the first display mode.

When it is instructed to simultaneously display the first display mode and the second display mode, the planning engine 3
Reads all the planning elements related to the schedule from the data model 4 and, for example, as shown in FIG.
The display in the second display mode is displayed on the display in the first display mode. Note that the display in the first display mode of FIG.
It is the same as 6.

That is, in the second display mode, the total of the number of vehicles produced each day is displayed in a bar graph, and the number of vehicles produced is displayed there. It is clear that the number entered in this bar graph corresponds to the total number of vehicles produced on all the lines for each day in the first display mode.

Further, in FIG. 28, reference numeral 30 designates the upper limit of the total number of units produced on all the production lines, which is called a limit bar here. And the upper limit value of the total number of production shown by this limit bar is 3
It is displayed in the area indicated by 1. That is, in FIG. 28, the limit bar 30 is located at the position "15".

The limit bar 30 can be moved in the vertical direction of the screen while being picked up by the mouse. When the limit bar 30 is moved, the limit bar 30 is moved.
It is possible to equalize the number of production in the part that exceeds the range.

Specifically, it is as follows. When it is necessary to adjust the upper limit of the total number of production units downward due to some reason, the limit bar 30 is moved downward. For example, in the state shown in FIG. If it is moved from the position of to the position of "12", a bar exceeding the limit bar 30 may appear as shown by 32 in FIG.

In such a case, it is necessary to readjust so that the total number of units produced is below the limit bar 30. This is the leveling described above, and when leveling is performed, the edit menu of FIG. 14 is displayed in the state of FIG. 29, and “schedule” is selected. As a result, the planning engine 3 is activated and the leveling process is executed.

In this leveling process, the planning engine 3 first forwards, for example, the lowest priority among the planning elements included in the bar to a vacant position within the same priority, If it still exceeds the limit bar 30, a process is performed to move the planning element included in the bar having the highest priority to the vacant position in the same priority. Still limit bar 3
If it exceeds 0, the next lowest priority is postponed, and if it still exceeds the limit bar 30, the next highest priority is moved forward in the order of priority. .

Therefore, in FIG. 29, the planning element having the lowest priority among the planning elements on the 7th day, that is, the planning element 33 of line 4 in this case, is postponed to the vacant position. As a result, as shown in FIG. 30, the planning element 33 has 8
Moved to the day, the total number of vehicles produced on the 7th day will be 10, and the limit bar will be 30 or less. In addition, the total number of vehicles produced on the 8th day is from 1 to 4
Increase to the stand. The planning element 33 that was moved at this time
Of course, an instance of will be updated.

This is the leveling process, but when the total number of production units to which the planning element is moved exceeds the limit bar 30, the planning engine 3 further delays the moved planning element.

The number of days to postpone can be set in advance. Then, if leveling is not possible within that range, the planning engine 3 displays a message to that effect. Further, in the leveling process, not only the priority order but also the delivery date can be combined.

Although one embodiment of the present invention has been described above, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited to the above embodiment and various modifications can be made.

[0091]

As is clear from the above description, according to the present invention, the structure of the planning element is based on the object-orientation including the instance and the method for processing the planning element. Can be displayed and the created schedule can be edited in various ways, so that the production plan schedule can be efficiently created.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of conditions required for production.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining that a production plan is expressed in a multidimensional space.

FIG. 4 is a diagram for explaining conversion of a three-dimensional space into a two-dimensional space.

FIG. 5 is a diagram for explaining conversion of a two-dimensional space into a one-dimensional space.

FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining a constraint condition of a manufacturing line.

FIG. 7 is a diagram for explaining a planning process.

FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing a process of planning.

FIG. 9 is a diagram for explaining a production pattern when elements are arranged.

10 is a diagram showing one solution obtained by the processing shown in FIG.

11 is a diagram showing a display example of the solution shown in FIG.

FIG. 12 is a diagram showing a display example of an instance of a planning element.

FIG. 13 is a diagram for explaining setting of a region to be modified.

FIG. 14 is a diagram showing a display example of an edit menu.

FIG. 15 is a diagram for explaining processing of rearrangement of extracted planning elements.

16 is a diagram for explaining conversion of the two-dimensional space shown in FIG. 15 into a one-dimensional space.

FIG. 17 is a diagram for explaining setting of an address of an area where relocation is possible.

18 is a diagram showing a production pattern of the planning element 12 extracted from the area 11 to be rearranged in FIG.

FIG. 19 is a diagram showing a production pattern of the planning element 13 extracted from the area 11 to be rearranged in FIG.

20 is a diagram showing an example of a solution regarding a line 2 of the area 11 to be rearranged in FIG.

21 is a diagram showing an example of a solution regarding a line 3 of the area 11 to be rearranged in FIG.

FIG. 22 is a diagram showing a display example of one solution obtained as a result of the rearrangement process.

[Fig. 23] "Chuses" in the edit menu shown in Fig. 14.
It is a figure which shows the example of a display of a submenu at the time of selecting.

FIG. 24 is a diagram showing a display example of a submenu when “condition” is selected from the edit menu shown in FIG. 14.

FIG. 25 is a diagram showing a display example of a submenu when “Date” is selected from the edit menu shown in FIG.

FIG. 26 is a diagram for explaining the movement of the planning element, showing the screen display before the movement.

FIG. 27 is a diagram for explaining the movement of the planning element, showing the screen display after the movement.

FIG. 28 is a diagram showing an example of a screen on which a first display mode and a second display mode are simultaneously displayed.

FIG. 29 is a view for explaining the leveling process, showing a screen display before the leveling process.

FIG. 30 is a diagram for explaining the leveling process, and is a diagram showing a screen display after the leveling process.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... input means, 2 ... display means, 3 ... planning engine,
4 ... Data model.

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A scheduling system for arranging elements to be scheduled in a multidimensional space defined by a restriction condition for scheduling, wherein elements arranged in the multidimensional space are grouped for each axis of the multidimensional space. A scheduling system characterized in that each scheduling element has a structure including an instance and a method for processing the scheduling element.