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First Fit Algorithm for Bin Packing

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Encyclopedia of Algorithms

Years and Authors of Summarized Original Work

  • 1974; Johnson, Demers, Ullman, Garey, Graham

  • 2013; Dósa, Sgall

Problem Definition

In the classical bin packing (BP) problem, we are given a set of items with rational sizes between 0 and 1, and we try to pack them into a minimum number of bins of unit size so that no bin contains items with total size more than 1. The problem definition originates in the early 1970s: Johnson’s thesis [10] on bin packing together with Graham’s work on scheduling [8, 9] (among other pioneering works) started and formed the whole area of approximation algorithms. The First Fit (FF) algorithm is one among the first algorithms which were proposed to solve the BP problem and analyzed in the early works. FF performs as follows: The items are first given in some list L and then are handled by the algorithm in this given order. Then, algorithm FF packs each item into the first bin where it fits; in case the item does not fit into any already opened bin, the...

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Recommended Reading

  1. Boyar J, Dósa G, Epstein L (2012) On the absolute approximation ratio for First Fit and related results. Discret Appl Math 160:1914–1923

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  3. Dósa G, Sgall J (2013) First Fit bin packing: a tight analysis. In: Proceedings of the 30th symposium on theoretical aspects of computer science (STACS), LIPIcs vol 3. Schloss Dagstuhl, Kiel, Germany, pp 538–549

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Pannonia, Egyetem street 10, PO 158, 8200, Veszprém, Hungary

    Gyorgy Dosa

Authors
  1. Gyorgy Dosa
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Correspondence to Gyorgy Dosa .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Ming-Yang Kao

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Dosa, G. (2016). First Fit Algorithm for Bin Packing. In: Kao, MY. (eds) Encyclopedia of Algorithms. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2864-4_487

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