DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF AN OPERATIONS PLANNING PACKAGE FOR A LOW COST COMPUTER SYSTEM

Abstract

To be able to have a quick and efficient way of laying out a cutting stock is of great interest to the local furniture companies. One main preoccupation of the furniture industry is in the optimum laying out of the panel sizes that made up a piece or even pieces of furniture such as cupboards, wardrobe, cabinets, etc on the rectangular stock sheets. To be able to optimize the material usage not only save cost but to be able to quickly have an accurate indication of the material needed for a piece or pieces of furniture enable the manufacturer to competitively give his quotation to his clients. This project looks into a computerized approach to the automatic arrangement of panels within rectangular stock sheets. As the local furniture companies are mainly small or medium in sizes, implementation of the approach in a low cost personal computer is well suited to their needs. Thus far, there is no computerized approach capable of giving a true optimal solution to every case. The program developed for use with a personal computer offers a quick and acceptable near-optimum result.