• Wednesday Lecture 10 to 11, F171
• Thursday Tutorial, 2 to 3 (this will run as and when needed)
• Friday Lecture, 10 to 11, F171

Many problems can be represented as a constraint satisfaction problem (CSP), i.e. a problem composed of a set of variables, each with a domain of values, where we have a set of constraints that restrict combinations of variable assignments. We are then to assign values to variables, satisfying those constraints (or show that no assignement exists.

There are lots of problems like this: scheduling, timetabling, design and configuration, routing, matching, ... the list is huge. These (commercial) applications have brought about a demand for CSP solving technology. One such technology is constraint programming (CP).

This course is about CSP and CP. We will look at CSP, and explore the underlying techniques, and then learn a CP (choco) and apply it to a range of problems.