Linear Programming - SelinGungor/pairwise-testing GitHub Wiki

Linear programming is the process of taking various linear inequalities relating to some situation, and finding the "best" value obtainable under those conditions. A typical example would be taking the limitations of materials and labor, and then determining the "best" production levels for maximal profits under those conditions.

In "real life", linear programming is part of a very important area of mathematics called "optimization techniques". This field of study (or at least the applied results of it) are used every day in the organization and allocation of resources. These "real life" systems can have dozens or hundreds of variables, or more. In algebra, though, you'll only work with the simple (and graphable) two-variable linear case.

The general process for solving linear-programming exercises is to graph the inequalities (called the "constraints") to form a walled-off area on the x,y-plane (called the "feasibility region"). Then you figure out the coordinates of the corners of this feasibility region (that is, you find the intersection points of the various pairs of lines), and test these corner points in the formula (called the "optimization equation") for which you're trying to find the highest or lowest value.