Dear Rich, Yes that sounds like a good application domain for constraint programming in general and Gecode in particular.
One idea might be to first try to get a feel for how to model your problem. There you might want to not use Gecode directly but something that is more accessible, for example MiniZinc (www.minizinc.org) as a modeling language. After you have convinced yourself how to model your problem I would switch to Gecode and think about how to integrate it into your product/environment. Cheers Christian -- Christian Schulte, Professor of Computer Science, KTH, www.ict.kth.se/~cschulte/ -----Original Message----- From: users-boun...@gecode.org [mailto:users-boun...@gecode.org] On Behalf Of Rich Morin Sent: Friday, January 10, 2014 6:32 PM To: users@gecode.org Subject: [gecode-users] newbie questions on a possible Gecode use case I'm working with a modeling approach (Inductive Process Modeling) that composes sets of "model structures" from specifications of "entities" and "processes". Some process combinations don't make sense, so we use sets of simple constraints in generating candidate model structures, eg: ALWAYS-TOGETHER These processes must always be used together. ATMOST-ONE At most one of these processes may be used. EXACTLY-ONE Exactly one of these processes must be used. FORBIDDEN This process must not be used. NECESSARY All of these processes must be used. Because the number of combinations could be very large, we generate pseudo-random subsets (of a specified size). These are evaluated (eg, fitting parameters to match observed data) and the best results are presented to the user for inspection. Currently, these combinations are being produced by means of complex Lisp code that performs boolean satisfiability logic. I'm wondering whether this task (along with possible follow-on extensions involving feedback from the evaluation task) might be a good use case for Gecode. (If this let me replace the code with a small set of constraints, I'd be a really happy camper. :-) I'm a complete newbie at Gecode, so I'm hoping for caveats, comments, suggestions, etc. In addition, if any Gecoders out there are available for small consulting projects, I'd like to hear from them (off-list!). -r -- http://www.cfcl.com/rdm Rich Morin r...@cfcl.com http://www.cfcl.com/rdm/resume San Bruno, CA, USA +1 650-873-7841 Software system design, development, and documentation _______________________________________________ Gecode users mailing list users@gecode.org https://www.gecode.org/mailman/listinfo/gecode-users _______________________________________________ Gecode users mailing list users@gecode.org https://www.gecode.org/mailman/listinfo/gecode-users
