How to create UDT - for a crew schedule

[holly]

Hi

Just out of a matter of interests does anyone have any ideas on
how I could accomplish an automated crew scheduler..

for example
today is 14.04.03 and shift 2 is working but at 22:00 hrs this
will change to shift 3 but at 00:00 the date will change but the
same crew will stay the same until 06:00 and the crew will be
shift 2 again.. etc etc

Thanks
PS Thes two shift work for three days then shift 1 and 4 come into
play

[holly]

Any Suggestions???

[jim mcnamara]

Your description needs some more detail.

Schedulers work basically in two ways:

I. manpower allocation

You have a project that requires, for example: 8
hours of machining, 10 hours finishing

You are free to schedule the job to as many or as
few people as possible. This is what Microsoft
Project does- it assigns people to a project over a
period of time. This doesn't sound like what you
are doing however.

II. arena scheduling

This is putting people in physical slots for a
time period, for example: You have two machines
that run 24 x 7

In this case you create (an array) of one hour
slots for 365 days for each machine. This allows
flexibility if machine #2 is down for a week. It
also allows you to compensate for workers being
out part or all of a shift.

Each slot has a day of year/duration/machine
assigned to it. You assign workers to the slot.
Usually the duration is fixed at one hour. Finer
granularity for duration means more array
elements.


This seems more like what you are talking about --
but I'm not really sure.

[Muddy]

Originally posted by holly
Any Suggestions???

Do you want to do it without help from a COM object? If not you could programatically do this with Msft Project, Schedule, or even Outlook ...

[holly]

Hi, Thnx for replying,

To be more explicit....Here is an example

My company works 24*7, 365 days a year on an 12hr shift pattern.

the shift patterns are 12hr continental shifts
06.00 - 18.00
18.00 - 0600

On a rotating basis the pattern is as follow - 2 days on, 2 days off, 3 days on 2 days of & last 3 days on...

now today is Wed - 14.05.2002 & shift 2 is working but @ 18:00 hrs...shift 4 will start work...BUT at 00.00 the date will change
but the crew will still be shift 4 until 06.00

Thanks

[jim mcnamara]

Use arena scheduling.

Assign 24 one hour blocks per day per employee.
When you create the array, use a UDT like this

Type TimeBlock
     EmployeeNum as Integer
     Shift as Integer
     TheDateandTime as Date ' make this as of the start of the hour
                           ' you can use Format to get the time from the data stamp
     Duration as Integer ' minutes in this block = 60 usually                      
     PositionCode as String ' location, workarea or machine # or whatever
End Type
' assume 20 employees
Dim Blocks(20,365,24) as TimeBlock

Populate the array with Shift,
TheDateandTime,Duration,PositionCode. Leave out
the employee number.

Save the data to disk.

Next, step thru your employess for the next 30
days, placing them into already existing shifts
and positions, then you can print a schedule.

[holly]

Jim - thnx for replying....As I relatively new to VB is the any chance
you could start me off on the right foot...I know your have attached and
example but this may sound a stupid question....but could you be
a bit more specifi
Thanks

[holly]

Has anyone any Ideas on the above???
Thanks

[Ruku]

Do you want to do it without help from a COM object? If not you could programatically do this with Msft Project, Schedule, or even Outlook ...

hey! I know this post is like uh... 3 years old, but uhm, I am also looking for a way to manage schedules...

you mentionned a COM object?

As for the code management, everything is fine,

I just need a GUI that would look kinda neat... I'm currently workin' on one but if some object already has everything I need, I won't bother making the object...

Thanks, (Thread revival! btw usin' .net 2.0, found this thread in search)