Better Algorithms for Online Bin Stretching via Computer Search

Online Bin Stretching is a problem closely related to Online Bin Packing and various scheduling problems. There is extensive history of computer search being used to establish lower bounds for this problem by identifying difficult sets of inputs. We demonstrate a novel approach enabling the use of computer search for finding new algorithms and therefore upper bounds for this problem. This not only leads to improved results for Online Bin Stretching, but also shows that computer search can be used to find new algorithms, even for problems that might not appear suitable for this approach.