Patent ID: 7246076

Claim:
A queue-based scheduling apparatus for automated staff scheduling and for enforcing scheduling rules and requirements, comprising: means for defining conditional and unconditional rules; means for ranking rules and requests in varying priority as represented by a numeric value assigned to each rule and request; and means for specifying rules both per individual and per group; and means for generating schedules in multiple phases; wherein during each phase, an automatic scheduler entirely schedules every assignment on every day in a scheduling period; wherein on second and later phases, said auto scheduler learns from any hazards detected in earlier phases to generate a better overall schedule; wherein said hazards are detected whenever said automatic scheduler cannot find an individual that would not violate some rule or request; said automatic scheduler determining if any conditional rule has caused detection of hazard, and if said conditional rule is satisfied, finding a source or a condition of the rule that generated a violating request; said automatic scheduler generating and submitting an internal request; and in subsequent phases, said automatic scheduler avoiding said hazard by using said submitted request from previous phases.