LINEAR PROGRAMMING SHORT COURSE

Special Research Report SR-62 For the past several years the Department of Mining 7 The Pennsylvania State University, has been engaged in developing the field . of operations research for the mining industry. In 1964 the Coal Research Board of the Pennsylvania Department of Mines and Mineral Industries ~fovided funds for research on operational problems for low-cost mining. This far-sighted support has resulted in the ap- plication of operations research methods to solve certain problems currently plaguing the coal industry. Because OR is still in its infancy, and because the gap between it and operating management has not been bridged, sufficient interest has not yet been generated for these ~ethods to be widely used. As a result, the Coal Research Board suggested that part of the research program·be directed toward the establishment of short courses to provide coal mine management with an administrative understanding of OR principles. This report undertakes to describe the course content presented in the first of a planned series of courses entitled "Practical Operations Research for Mine Management." The objectives of this first short course were to give a balanced and detailed presentation of some of the basic concepts and theories of linear prograrmning and to show how it can be applied in a variety of situations. In spite of the news coverage given to linear programming, there is obviously a need for an understanding of linear prograrmning methods since few mining people know how it can be • used in their own companies