【正文】
re referred to as automated guided vehicle systems (AGVSs). Fig. 1 gives an example of such an AGVS in a distribution center of puter hard and software (De Koster et al., 2021), in which guided vehicles transport (pallet) loads between locations, . from receiving lanes to storage areas, and from storage areas to shipping lanes. The design and control processes of an AGVS involve many issues. The main ones are: guidepath design, estimating the number of vehicles required (or determining vehicle requirements), vehicle scheduling, idlevehicle positioning, battery management, vehicle routing and deadlock resolution. They belong to different levels of the decisionmaking process. The guidepath design can be seen as a problem at strategic level. The decision at this 中英文資料 5 stage has a strong impact on decisions at other levels. Issues at tactical level include estimating the number of vehicles, scheduling vehicle (vehicle scheduling decision may belong to both tactical and operational levels), positioning idle vehicles and, managing batterycharging scheme. Finally, vehicle routing, deadlock resolution (and prevention) problems are addressed at operational level. During the design and control processes, some interactions and iterations can be seen between steps. For example, the type of the guidepath system directly influences the number of vehicles required and the plexity of the vehicle scheduling system. Fig. 1 The guidedvehicle system of a distribution center Traditional AGV systems use fixed guidepaths for vehicles. Modern AGV systems differ from the classic ones as described, for instance, in the books of J252。 King and Wilson, 1991。 pickup and delivery (P/D) locations can be considered as nodes on a graph connected by a set of arcs. The arcs describe the p