The bin packing problem is a simplified example of a problem found in many industrial settings, such as configuration of telecommunications switching equipment. In this lesson, you will learn more about modeling techniques, including combining constraints. You will also learn how to modify a model during the solve phase--you will add constraints to the model during search.

In this problem you have components of different types and bins of various types. There are various constraints on which type of component can go into which type of bin. You must find the minimum total number of bins required to contain the components.

In this example there are five types of components: glass, plastic, steel, wood, copper. There are three types of bins: red, blue, green.

Each type of bin has a different capacity:

Each type of bin can only contain certain types of components:

There are also some special requirements on the mixing of component types:

There are some limits on certain types of components in certain types of bins:

The demand for each type of component is:

The first step in modeling and solving a problem is to write a natural language description of the problem, identifying the decision variables and the constraints on these variables.

Write a natural language description of this problem. Answer these questions: