In the online bin packing problem, a sequence of items with sizes in the interval (0,1] arrive one by one and need to be packed into bins, so that each bin contains items of total size at most 1. Each item must be irrevocably assigned to a bin before the next item becomes available. The algorithm has no knowledge about future items.
There is an unlimited supply of bins available, and the goal is to
minimize the total number of used bins (bins that receive at least one
item). We present an online bin packing algorithm with absolute
competitive ratio 5/3, which is optimal.