Using pattern matching for tiling and packing problems

This paper describes a new placement method based on pattern matching for 2D tiling problems. Tiling problem can be considered as a special case of bin packing. In the proposed method, the representation of the figures and the board is based on directional chain codes. Contrary to other works that the area has been used for the board and the figures, the proposed method is based on usage of their boundaries instead. With this representation, consideration of the area has been replaced with that of the exact string matching. With the proposed knowledge representation, rotation and reflection of the figures can be considered easily. The results of a hybrid approach of genetic algorithm and simulated annealing have been shown. This new method, introduces a novel approach for handling and solving a variety of 2D-packing problems.