Function Chart of Timetabling in WebSAMS version 1.0
School Management & Staff
Timetabling (TTL)
 Proper data of class, room & teacher
should be entered as no addition &
deletion are allowed in TTL.
Data Capture
Data Planning
Structure Setup
School Data Setup
Lesson Setup
Period Blocking
 Subject to Structure
Setup
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Import Dataset
Copy Dataset
Load Dataset
Delete Dataset
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Setup Basic Structure
View Winter Timetable
View Summer Timetable
Modify Start Time
Modify Period
Customize Pre-school Assembly
Customize Break
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Teacher (Edit)
Room (Edit)
Class (Edit)
Subject (Add, Delete & Edit)
Room Group (Add, Delete & Edit)
Class Group (Add, Delete & Edit)
Exclusive Subject Group (Add, Delete
& Edit)
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Normal Lesson (Add, Delete, Edit & Group)
Special Lesson (Form, Un-form & Edit)
View All Details
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Teacher (Block & Unblock)
Room (Block & Unblock)
Class (Block & Unblock)
Subject (Block & Unblock)
Class Subject (Block & Unblock)
Lesson (Block & Unblock)
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Confirm
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Class (Assign & Un-assign)
Teacher (Assign & Un-assign)
Room (Assign & Un-assign)
Subject (Assign & Un-assign)
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Generate Result Set
Delete Result Set
Query Status
View Unscheduled Lesson
List Relaxed Constraint Details
Interactive Tuning
o Tune unscheduled lesson (Schedule &
Split Double Period Lesson)
o Tune scheduled lesson (Un-schedule,
Swap, Change Room, Fix Slot,
Unfix Slot & Reject Slot)
o Tune fixed slot for lesson (Fix & Unfix)
o Tune rejected slot for lesson (Un-reject)
o Resume generation
o End interactive tuning
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Timetable (View)
Free Resource (View)
Duty Replacement
Scheduling
Data Validation
Pre-assignment
 Subject to Data
Validation
Generating
 Subject to Data
Validation
Online Enquiry
 Information on free room and free teacher
for each period will be exported for staff deployment.
Report
Staff Deployment
Function Chart of Timetabling in WebSAMS version 1.0
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New data can either be imported from School Management and Staff modules (Class, Teacher, Room, Class Subject &
Number of Periods) or a file that contains timetabling data in a pre-defined format.
Only one set of data can be loaded at a time to perform data planning and scheduling.
Copying and deletion of dataset are allowed where necessary.
Timetable Basic Structure is used to set up the number of maximum periods per day, start time of schooling, duration for
each period, type, number and duration of break.
Under global setup, individual setup is allowed. However, the former, once changed, would supersede the latter.
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Addition and deletion of class, teacher and room are not allowed.
Modifications on teacher short name, maximum daily load limit and capacity of room are allowed.
Room group can be created in order to accommodate lessons e.g. Lab. Group containing Chemistry Lab & Biology Lab.
Addition and deletion of subject down to each class are also allowed but not recommended. Some constraints may be
imposed on class subject so as to regulate timetable pattern.
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Data captured are used to form lessons (class-subject-teacher-room-period type) for scheduling timetable.
User should plan a lesson with respect to: ‘Who is/are going to teach a class subject?’,’ Where is the class subject taught?’
‘In what form (e.g. split or combined) should it be taught?’ and ‘What is the period type assigned to lesson?’.
Two types of lessons can be defined, namely normal lesson and special lesson. Special lesson is formed from Normal
lesson and can be un-formed back to it where necessary . In fact, the latter can be added and deleted but not recommended.
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Periods can be blocked at class, teacher, room, subject, class subject and lesson levels so as to make certain available
timeslots for lessons.
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Teaching duties among teachers are reassigned in a cyclic fashion (e.g. Teacher A to Teacher B, Teacher B to Teacher C and
Teacher C to Teacher A) to ease scheduling of a copied dataset.
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Before a timetable is generated, resource availability (lessons for class, teacher and room) will be checked against to detect
infeasible lessons.
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Lessons can be assigned by means of class, teacher, room and subject.
pre-assigned lessons may be removed.
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After data planning and/or pre-assignment, timetable will be generated in an auto-mode within a time limit.
Constraints can be relaxed on need basis. For example, two single period subject lessons can be scheduled on a school day.
5 methods of scheduling mechanisms are provided for auto-generation.
Generation can take place as many times as possible.
If there are unscheduled lessons left even after the auto-generation, interactive tuning allows adjusting lessons manually.
During the interactive tuning, batch fixing of lessons is allowed so as to retain the best timeslots for scheduled lessons.
To reject timeslots for lessons can also be achieved in a way similar to period blocking.
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User can preview timetables for class, teacher, room and subject before report printing.
Free teacher and room are also available for reference.
However, if there is any change in data planning,
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Function Chart of Timetabling in WebSAMS version 1.0
 Data Capture
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Data of teachers and non-teachers once having teaching duties can also be imported.
Copying of one set of any previously defined datasets is allowed at a time. The status of the
working data set will not be affected. Any change in staff would be adjusted in the copied data
set.
 Data Planning – School Data Setup
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Imposition of constraints on class subject certainly affects the scheduling process. These items
include: Exclusive Room Usage indicating whether a room that can accommodate
one or more than one class at any time e.g. P.E. , Non-Successive Day indicating whether
subject lessons of a given class can be scheduled in successive days, e.g. ,P. E. for some
primary schools, Cross Recess indicating whether a multi-period subject lesson can be
scheduled across recess, No. of Multiple Periods per school day indicating whether
multiple periods of a subject can be scheduled on a school day and Split of Double Period
Lesson into single periods.
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Each setup may be an individual class subject constraint setup. Nevertheless, in the
process of generating timetable, user may choose to relax these constraints globally. For
example, user relaxes the constraint ‘across recess’ to mean that all multiple-period subject
lessons are likely to be conducted across the recess time.
 Data Planning – Lesson Setup
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A normal lesson is a lesson that involves a single class of students, one or more teaching staff,
and a room (probably out of a room group), e.g. co-teaching a class in a single room.
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A special lesson can be considered as either a lesson that involves multiple classes (or a class
group) or a batch of at least two lessons that are to be scheduled to the same timeslot, e.g.
lessons with split class (for teaching the same subject or split subjects), combined class, split &
combined class and alternate week execution.
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2 or more normal lesson threads can be grouped to form a single thread for the purpose of lesson
batch editing. For example, 1A-Chinese-Teacher A-Home Room-3 single periods and
1A-Chinese-Teacher A-Home Room-5 single periods can be grouped as
1A-Chinese-Teacher A-Home Room-8 single Periods.
 Data Planning - Period Blocking
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A blocking at a “higher” resource level (e.g. class) will “propagate” its effect to the ”lower”
resource level(s) (e.g. class subject). For example, to block subject ‘English’ at Day 1 period 1
means that all classes with subject ‘English’ will be blocked at this timeslot.
(Un)blocking a resource at lower level will induce no effect to the relevant resource entities at
higher level.
A lesson may be blocked at some period for more than one reason. For example, both of the
lesson’s associated room and teacher are blocked at the concerned period.