Multiple Resources Scheduled Simultaneously

Unlike other schedulers that assign resources to a time slot, the Fast system schedules activities that may require many different resources simultaneously.  The system finds the time intervals when all required resources are available and shows those times to the scheduler.  Here are a few examples:  Suppose you are scheduling people and there is a task or meeting that requires three people.  The system looks at the availabilitiy of the three people and finds all the times when those three people are simultaneously available.  Then the scheduler (a person if the scheduling is being done manually, or decision logic if the scheduling is being done automatically) selects the start time desired.  Other scheduling systems require that the scheduler assign each of the three people one-at-a-time to the same time slot.  As a schedule develops, the availability of the resources gets a little complicated.  So finding simultaneous availability is difficult when these systems.  The FAST system finds all of these “slots” and presents them to the decision maker (manual) or the decision logic (automated).

Imagine scheduling an activity that requires several people, multiple pieces of equipment, a facility and some supplies.  Then imagine that all of these resources have previous obligations over the time horizon you are scheduling.  Now find the ability to schedule that activity.  With a resource scheduling system, the user has to find the time interval when all of these resources are simultaneouslyt available.  The FAST system finds all of these possibilities.

Almost all situations are better modeled by scheduling activities rather than scheduling resources individually.  In sports scheduling, you need fields, referees and teams as resources.  You want to schedule games, not each of these resources individually.  In event planning, you want to schedule events that require rooms, servers, tables, chairs etc.  In manufacturing, you want to schedule procedures that require machines, techicians, supplies etc.  For services, you want to schedule repair calls that require technicians, vehicles, parts etc.  You can see that resources schedulers are inadequate for such environments.

Now in our next blog we will show how the resources requirements do not have to be for the entire duration of the activity.  Be sure to read that one!