Search results

The design of manufacturing systems is a complex and expensive task for both SMEs and large organisations alike. Many problems relating to the design and operation of manufacturing systems are too complex to allow for mathematical treatment, and as a result there is increasing recognition of the applicability of simulation in the manufacturing environment. This has in turn resulted in a growth in simulation software products available in the marketplace, and manufacturers of such products are naturally keen to extol the virtues of what they sell. In a rapidly changing workplace, there is some suggestion that simulation tools may not have developed to deal with the new demands, and so it is timely to review what is on offer. This paper presents the results of a survey of European simulation specialists, both working in industry and in an academic environment, on the use of simulation software. The main purpose of this survey was to determine how satisfied users are with simulation software and to highlight the most positive and negative features. The findings offer an insight into current software, and how this can be further enhanced.

Typical assembly cell development requires that the hardware be mostly functional before significant software development can begin. Utilizing a software simulation of the hardware allows concurrent development of the hardware and software and provides many benefits including reduced time to market. Traditional simulation tools, though, are geared towards prototyping and early application development, but for advanced applications are of little or no use during later stages of development and deployment. The Cimetrix CODE (Cimetrix Open Development Environment) system provides a unique solution that supports development of a single software application that can drive not only the simulation, but also the physical machine, without the use of a translator. CODE applications run on Windows NT and can take full advantage of the wide range of third party software and hardware available on that platform. This article will explore the use of simulation throughout the life cycle of an assembly cell, including project definition, development and maintenance, and discuss the benefits that simulation can provide.

The aim of this paper is to highlight the application of six sigma, software engineering techniques and simulation to software development with a view to improving the software process and product.

This paper attempts to integrate six sigma and simulation to define, analyse, measure and predict various elements of software development (such as cost, schedule, defects) that influence software quality, thereby helping the software personnel take necessary measures early in the development process to improve the software processes and remove defects. Simulation results provide qualitative and quantitative suggestions on the ways to change the software process to achieve six sigma quality. The integration of six sigma and CMM and the role of knowledge management in software organisations have been taken into account.

Most software organisations operate between 2.3 and 3 sigma level. This paper presents a framework for definition, measurement, and analysis of important elements of the software product and process using six sigma tools and exploits the use of simulation in bringing six sigma improvements. Case studies have been presented to demonstrate the findings.

Application of the techniques presented in this paper would definitely improve software organisations' processes and product.

The adoption of methodologies outlined in this paper in software companies would enable them to attain improvements in terms of cost, schedule and quality.

The integration of simulation with six sigma applied to software development is novel in this paper. This paper will be valuable for quality professionals and management personnel in software organisations.

The purpose of this paper is to identify a business simulation appropriate for MEng Engineering students. The selection was based on the following factors; exploring methods for evaluating potential software and enhancing the learner experience.

An interdisciplinary project team was formed to try and resolve the pedagogic, technical and business aspects that would need to be addressed in order to implement such software within the programme. Tools included a questionnaire to assess the potential enhancement of employability skills and a usability questionnaire on ease of use. These were supplemented with discourse on technical and pedagogic issues.

After the initial scoping study, the findings indicated that two business simulation software packages had potential. These were “Marketplace – Venture Strategy” and “SimVenture”. Marketplace proved to be the most suitable in terms of the pedagogic and technical requirements.

The authors were not able to fully trial each simulation over the recommended duration of play because of practical time constraints and they did not have any student contribution to the process. Findings will need to be verified with the piloting cohort of students. Further pedagogic research could be carried out to evidence the enhancement to the student learning experience.

This study is valuable because it purposefully uses an interdisciplinary team comprising expertise in teaching and learning, technology, business and sector knowledge. This was vital in the decision‐making process. It is also valuable in its development of generic methods and tools to measure and evaluate software suitability in relation to usability and employability skills.

In order to be competitive and progress to a state of excellence in manufacture, companies are currently experiencing change. Decisions have to be made about the best way forward, and some insight into the possible outcomes is desirable. There is a small but growing awareness among British manufacturing companies that simulation could aid this insight, but potential users face the problem of evaluating and selecting from the many proprietary systems, the one which best matches their requirements at some preferred cost. Selection is made more difficult by continual updates and modifications to systems and by new software suppliers entering the market. Uses a research case study as the vehicle for proposing a framework for assessment and selection of simulation systems involving the use of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Illustrates how this technique was used to make a system selection which matched a company′s selection criteria.

The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of the role of the bottlenecks in the dynamic software development supply chains. The paper examines the effects of the task priorities in the software development and investigates the possible strategies to manage them effectively.

In this paper, a software development supply chain has been simulated. This includes modeling of the various sizes of software requirement, different priorities, variations in development times, quality defects, etc. The model assumes a fixed set of resources of various skills. The model is studied for the bottlenecks, throughput, work in progress (WIP), etc. under various work preemption scenarios.

The results indicate that job priorities impact the bottleneck formulation, throughput and WIP of the software development. The work interruption policies to accommodate priority jobs adversely impact the throughput. Selective introduction of interruptions by leaving the bottlenecks from interruptions helps balancing the throughput and priorities.

The impact of the learning curve and knowledge acquisition time needed by the resources to restart the interrupted work has not been considered in this paper, which can be a future area of research.

The paper helps the practicing managers evaluate the dynamics of the bottlenecks with various task management approaches and comprehend the possible tradeoffs between priority and throughout.

The paper looks at software development from a perspective of workflow dynamics. This is a pioneer effort, as it utilizes simulation and modeling approach in understanding the software supply chains better.

The aim of this paper was to explore the use of objective fabric parameters in 3D virtual garment simulation.

Two methods (fabric assurance by simple testing and Browzwear's fabric testing kit) of obtaining objective fabric measurements and the derived parameters for virtual garment simulation were studied. Three parameters (extension, shear and bend) were investigated to establish whether the selected virtual software derived comparable parameters from the objective fabric measurements.

It was found that the conversion from the objective fabric measurement data to the required parameters for virtual simulation varied significantly. Manual analysis of the objective measurements showed the two test methods to be comparable for extension and shear parameters; However, some adjustment to the test method was required. The third parameter to be investigated (bending rigidity) concluded that the test methods and results obtained from the two different apparatus were not comparable and recommended further experimentation using a different testing technique.

Future research should be conducted on a larger variety of fabrics ensuring comparable loads are used in the testing of the extensibility parameters. An expansion of this preliminary study should give more conclusive evidence of the trends observed.

Objective measurement of extension, shear and bend properties was investigated in relation to the derived parameters for a selected virtual simulation package. An understanding of such parameters will aid the general industry in adapting 3D virtual garment simulation as part of the standard product development process, resulting in a significantly shorter product development cycle.

The paper aims to study manpower dynamics at offshore and onsite location for maintenance project, which are transferred to offshore location in a phase-wise manner. The purpose of the paper is to find good values of onsite–offshore team strength, the number of hours of communication between onsite and offshore teams for smooth transfer of software maintenance project to offshore location.

This study uses system dynamics simulation approach to study manpower allocation at onsite and offshore locations to transfer the maintenance work to offshore location in a gradual manner. The authors consulted 13 experts from Indian software outsourcing industry during the model construction and validation.

The simulation results show that the complexity of maintenance project has an insignificant effect on offshore migration. The maintenance work transfer should start with initial onsite team strength higher than that of required for ticket solving and project. The initial offshore team strength should be based on training capacity available at the onsite location. The higher attrition rate at an offshore is detrimental for offshore migration.

The implication of the study is in the development of a broad framework of software maintenance work transfer to offshore locations for Indian software outsourcing projects. As the study is based on expert opinion in the context of India, it cannot be generalized for outsourcing scenarios elsewhere.

The software project manager can use the findings to get more insight into maintenance project offshore migration and divide the software team between onsite and offshore location.

The study is novel as there is little attempt at finding the manpower composition at onsite and offshore locations for software maintenance project during the migration phase.

One of the most challenging problems facing industrial engineers concerns the design and operational planning of today′s sophisticated production systems. The need for a detailed quantitative analysis is far more apparent than ever before. The application of discrete‐event simulation has been growing rapidly in the analysis of production systems. This is because no other quantitative methods can provide the flexibility, realism and predictive accuracy offered by the simulation technique. Although the important role that simulation can play in analysing production systems has now been generally realised, its use is not necessarily straightforward. The successful implementation of simulation projects usually depends on several factors which include, inter alia, the availability of simulation expertise and the ability of the available simulation software to model readily and accurately the environment under consideration. The areas of production systems where simulation can be applied are outlined. The essential considerations which must be studied when applying simulation are also discussed. An overview of simulation modelling environments that are currently used is then taken. Recommendations for future work of importance from the system analysis viewpoint are highlighted.

Scheduling problems in steel plants tend to be difficult and require complex algorithms due to many constraints. An approach is presented where only the main constraints are included in the scheduling algorithm. The schedule is validated using a discrete‐event simulation model that includes additional detail.

The combined approach is utilised for production scheduling in a steel mill in Finland. Operational performance of the steel mill is measured before and after software installation. The paper presents the scheduling environment, the software application and the resulting increase of production.

Case experiences indicate that combining optimisation techniques with simulation is beneficial. The optimisation can be kept simpler as validation with a simulation model increases the credibility and accuracy of the resulting schedule. During software development and testing, the simulation model offered a testing environment for the optimisation algorithm.

The case implementation was a success that increased production without making trade‐offs with other production goals. Company management estimate the productivity increase directly caused by the project to be worth €2,500,000 annually.

The paper presents a successful application of simulation for schedule validation in a complex and demanding environment.