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UniTime / unitime

Comprehensive University Timetabling System
http://www.unitime.org
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Import the Purdue benchmark data in UniTime #90

Closed GuoYuanxinKevin closed 3 years ago

GuoYuanxinKevin commented 3 years ago

How am I supposed to try the Purdue datasets in Unitime (https://www.unitime.org/uct_datasets.php)? I tried importing in the data exchange page but it just prompts Waiting

tomas-muller commented 3 years ago

The course timetabling benchmark datasets cannot be imported into UniTime. They are in the format that is used by the constraint solver (see here) and only contain the information that is needed by the solver (see here). They are anonymized and do not have enough information -- for example, in UniTime you can set preferences and requirements on different levels, but the solver file only contains a list of available rooms and times for each class with the preferences translated into penalties.

The purpose of these data sets is for other researchers to be able to replicate our results and possibly to use the data sets in their own research, building their own solver algorithms. If you are interested in this, please take a look at the International Timetabling Competition (www.itc2019.org) that we have co-organized.

GuoYuanxinKevin commented 3 years ago

Thanks so much!

One more question, if I want to use UniTime for the course scheduling problem for my university, should I manually enter the data via the interface?

tomas-muller commented 3 years ago

A lot of the data can be imported using the XML interfaces described at www.unitime.org/uct_interfaces.php.

But it is also possible to enter most of the data through the UniTime user interface (all except students and their course demands or last-like demands -- though, it is possible to build the course timetable without that, using curricula instead).