Dynamic placement of records and the classical occupancy problem

Abstract

This paper considers some mathematical problems of dynamic allocation as customers arrive to a linear storage. We show the connection between the placement problem and the well-known classical occupancy problem. The paper discusses the approximation of the expected distance between consecutive requests on the basis of a continuous record reference distribution. The model when access probabilities of records are estimated by a sample of order statistics of uniformly distributed random variables is also discussed. On the basis of Bayesian approach a dynamic programming solution is also given.