ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the basic concepts of optimization problems which are classified into two general categories, constrained optimization problems and unconstrained optimization problems. Optimization problems are also classified into two other categories: linear optimization problems and nonlinear optimization problems. The chapter focuses on linear program (LP), which is simply a linear constrained optimization problem. In operations research, LP’s are categorized according to the form of the model and the different categories are named according to the prototypical example of the form. The chapter considers two very common types of LP’s; the transportation problem and the assignment problem. The algorithm used to find optimal solutions to linear programming problems is called the Simplex method. The chapter discusses the basics of how the Simplex method works, where the Simplex method applies only to maximization linear programs with inequality constraints.
