Is everything scheduled?

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Have you read the PMBok? Yes? Then you've got Henry Gantt's charts, the critical path, and precedence scheduling down tight. Correct?

Read a bit about Taylor and "scientific management". Excellent, then you know that people doing defined tasks are just interchangeable parts, or they were in 1910.

How about "The Critical Chain" by Goldratt? Do you understand buffers and milestone protection? Is that a yes?

Super! Now you're ready to schedule your project, or just schedule yourself
Right?
Wrong!

Not unless you can give chapter and verse on these:

• One machine scheduling vs two machine scheduling (Can you optimize a single to-do list, or a washer and dryer for 10 loads?)
• Task sequencing impacts in one-machine scheduling?
• Parameters for optimizing for Shortest Processing Time?
• "Weighted completion times"
• Minimization of maximum lateness
• Earliest due date
• Priority inversion
• Preemption and context switching
• Thrashing and system freeze
• Responsiveness vs throughput trade-off

In point of fact, I thought I had a pretty good grip on scheduling until I read Chapter 5 Scheduling in a book I've cited before: "Algorithms to Live By". Authors: Christian and Griffiths. That's where you'll find answers to all this stuff.

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