EXTENDING CONSTRAINT SATISFACTION PROBLEM SOLVING

A computer-implemented method for resource management includes storing in a memory a set of resource consumers, resources for allocation to the resource consumers, and initial binary constraints applying to the allocation of the resources. Respective variables are associated with the resource consumers, and the resources are identified as values applicable to the variables. A non-binary scoring criterion is applied to generate scores on a graded scale for proposed assignments of one or more of the resources to respective ones of the resource consumers. One or more additional binary constraints are defined based on the graded scale of the scores. An assignment is found of the values to the variables that satisfies the initial and additional binary constraints using a constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) solver running on a processor that is coupled to the memory. The resources are assigned to the resource consumers responsively to the assignment of the values to the variables.