Applied simulated annealing (Q1309041)

[The articles of this volume will not be indexed individually.] The book gives a good overview of a number of applications that can be made with the simulated annealing (SA) method of solutions for highly combinatorial problems. The theory behind the model is briefly exposed in the introduction to the book under two variants: the inhomogeneous and the homogeneous simulated annealing algorithm. The various papers then follow, basically treating a set of different applications. However, the first two papers are somewhat more theoretical than the others inasmuch as they are concerned with some general side aspects of the SA-methods, namely the possibility to treat the problem through parallelization, or to introduce some notions as information theory and entropy. This last aspect is quite relevant considering the physical analogy (annealing of metals) on which this mathematical approach is based. The remaining papers are more directly involved with particular problem: two papers address the quadratic assignment problem (QAP); three others show how to use SA to solve school timetables problems and the remaining nine papers are solving various industrial or real-life problems about optimal location and allocation, about partitioning and about image processing. All papers are fairly easy to access and provide generally clear numerical examples with their solution. On the whole the book gives a very convincing demonstration of the power of the SA method to solve a number of combinatorial problems and is an invitation to the reader to try this SA-method on whatever other problem of these types he may have. The titles of the various papers and their authors are given in the following list which includes an introduction and a set of final remarks, presumably by the editor of the book (R. V. V. Vidal), which provide a nice unifying framework to the whole of the text. Introduction (1-16); \textit{R. Diekmann}, \textit{R. Lüling}, \textit{J. Simon}: Problem independent distributed simulated annealing and its applications (17-44); \textit{M. R. D. Rodrigues}, \textit{A. J. B. Anjo}: On simulating thermodynamics (45-60); \textit{K. Andersen}, \textit{R. V. V. Vidal}: Solving the quadratic assignment problem (61-84); \textit{J. Paulli}: A computational comparison of simulated annealing and tabu search applied to the quadratic assignment problem (85-102); \textit{D. Abramson}, \textit{H. Dang}: School timetables: A case study in simulated annealing (103-124); \textit{K. A. Dowsland}: Using simulated annealing for efficient allocation of students to practical classes (125-150); \textit{P. Dige}, \textit{C. Lund}, \textit{H. F. Ravn}: Timetabling by simulated annealing (151-174); \textit{P. Chardaire}, \textit{J. L. Lutton}: Using simulated annealing to solve concentrator location problems in telecommunication networks (175-200); \textit{K. Andersen}, \textit{V. B. Iversen}, \textit{R. V. V. Vidal}: Design of a teleprocessing communication network using simulated annealing (201-216); \textit{T. D. Hansen}: Location of civil defence sirens (217-238); \textit{R. V. V. Vidal}: Solving the afforestation problem (239-254); \textit{J. F. C. Oliveira}, \textit{J. A. S. Ferreira}: Algorithms for nesting problems (255-274); \textit{B. Liégeois}, \textit{M. Pirlot}, \textit{J. Teghem}, \textit{E. Trauwaert}, \textit{D. Tuyttens}: Balanced grouping through simulated annealing (275-290); \textit{R. V. V. Vidal}: Optimal partition of an interval -- the discrete version (291-312); \textit{C. K. Olsson}: Simulated annealing in image processing (313-334); \textit{V. B. Iversen}, \textit{J. M. Rygaard}, \textit{R. V. V. Vidal}: Optimal pallet capacity for a FMS (335-354); Final Remarks (355-356).