Cellular automata approach to scheduling problem

Abstract

In the paper we propose using cellular automata (CAs) to solve a problem of scheduling tasks of a parallel program in the two processor system. We examine a hypothesis that a nonlinear structure of a program graph can be approximated by a linear CA structure. Corresponding CAs solving the scheduling problem act according to some rules which must be found. Searching effective rules is conducted with the use of a genetic algorithm (GA). We show that for any initial allocation of tasks, a CA with discovered rules is able to find optimal or near-optimal solutions. Corresponding architecture of a CA is simpler than the ones known in the literature.