Patent ID: 8521785

Claim:
A method of selecting an optimal value from a solution space for a constraint problem, the method comprising: mapping, using a processor, the solution space to a range of finite sequential values; storing, in a memory, a binary tree data structure comprising a plurality of nodes, the plurality of nodes including a first node, the first node comprising a first node range of one or more values, the first node range comprising a first bound and a second bound; receiving a selection range of one or more values to be excluded as the optimal value from the range of finite sequential values, the selection range comprising a first bound and a second bound; determining whether the selection range should be merged with the first node range; in response to a first determination that the selection range should be merged with the first node range, updating the second bound of the first node range to be equivalent to the second bound of the selection range; in response to a second determination that the selection range should not be merged with the first node range, adding a second node to the binary tree data structure, the second node comprising a second node range, the second node range comprising a first bound and a second bound, wherein the second node range is equivalent to the selection range, the first bound of the second node range is equivalent to the first bound of the selection range, and the second bound of the second node range is equivalent to the second bound of the selection range; and determining that excluding any values represented by the binary tree data structure from the range of finite sequential values represents the optimal value for the constraint problem.