PONTIFEX was a mid-1980s project that introduced a novel approach to complex aircraft fleet scheduling, partially funded by the European Commission

European Commission

The European Commission is the executive body of the European Union. The body is responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the Union's treaties and the general day-to-day running of the Union....

’s Strategic Programme for R&D in Information Technology.

Since the mathematical problems stemming from non trivial fleet scheduling easily become computationally unsolvable, the PONTIFEX idea consisted in a seamless merge of algorithms and heuristic

Heuristic

Heuristic refers to experience-based techniques for problem solving, learning, and discovery. Heuristic methods are used to speed up the process of finding a satisfactory solution, where an exhaustive search is impractical...

 knowledge embedded in rules. The system, based on domain knowledge collected from airliners Alitalia

Alitalia

Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. , in its later stages known as Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. in Extraordinary Administration, was the former Italian flag carrier...

, KLM, Swissair

Swissair

Swissair AG was the former national airline of Switzerland.It was formed from a merger between Balair and Ad Astra Aero , in 1931...

, and TAP Portugal

TAP Portugal

TAP Portugal, commonly known as TAP, is the national airline of Portugal. It has its head office in Building 25 on the grounds of Portela Airport in Lisbon, and has been a member of the Star Alliance since 14 March 2005, the same day on which the company celebrated its 60th anniversary...

, was first adopted by Swissair and Alitalia in the late 1980s, then also by the Italian railroad national operator, for their cargo division. It is still in use today (2008).