Implement OR Model-Driven Information Systems at Norfolk Southern Clark Cheng Operations Research Norfolk Southern Railway Atlanta, Georgia INFORMS 2012 Annual Meeting Phoenix, Arizona

Agenda Overview of OR Decision Support Systems at NS Success Factors General Technology Footprint Examples of Technologies : –Real-time System - SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) Locomotive Assignment and Routing System –Decision Support System – Client Server Architecture Hump Yard Simulation Model and 3-D Animation –BI/Analytics – GIS and Mobile Technology GIS Map Dashboard on iPAD Q&A

What Do the Users Want? They need an operable “car”, not just an fancy “engine”

Success Factors Open Minded in Adopting New Technology –SOA (Service Oriented Architecture) –Cloud Computing –Grid Computing –RIA (Rich Internet Application) –Big Data (Data growth by 20 times by 2020) Consistent Delivery Method –Minimize footprint of technologies –Better user experience (UX) –Browser based user interfaces (UI) –Client Server Architecture and Distributed System –Deployed on NS production servers with 24x7 support Rapid Turnaround –Close relationship with business users –Serve the business needs Senior Management Support –OR’s creativity and capabilities

General Technology Footprint Browser-based Applications –High availability and automatic updates RIA User Interfaces –(Java applet), GWT, Flex, Ajax Back End –Java EJB, Hibernate, Apache Axis 2 –DB2, Teradata, MongoDB Middle Tier –WebLogic, Apache, Tomcat Special Purpose Software –Discrete event simulation framework –Business rule management system (BRMS)

Software Reliability and Quality Control Source Code Version Control Merant PVCS Release Management and Incident Tracking HP Quality Center Automated Testing HP Load Runner

Locomotive Assignment & Routing System (LARS) Road Fleet Size Model –Determine the number of locomotives needed in the road fleet for current operations and forecasted traffic demand Short-Term Locomotive Surplus/Deficit Forecast –Forecast locomotive surplus/deficit in 24 – 48 hours and improve the productivity of locomotives Shop Routing and Real-time Assignments –Model generates recommendations of optimal assignments of locomotives to outbound trains –Consider locomotive operations at a more detailed level than any human could possibly do

Software components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery deployment environment Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Thin Clients Traffic Manager Apache Webserver WebLogic Server Software Components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery environments Browser based RIA desktop and mobile client created using GWT, Flex, Ajax

Software components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery deployment environment Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Thin Clients Traffic Manager Apache Webserver WebLogic Server Application delivery controlled and local traffic managed by F5 BigIP LTM (Local Traffic Manager) Software Components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery environments

Software components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery deployment environment Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Thin Clients Traffic Manager Apache Webserver WebLogic Server Clustered Apache web servers with WebLogic proxy maintains round robin affinity sessions Software Components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery environments

Software components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery deployment environment Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Thin Clients Traffic Manager Apache Webserver WebLogic Server Clustered WebLogic Application server on UltraSPARC T2 Software Components and Environment: Production, Quality Control, Development and Disaster Recovery environments

Consumes enterprise security Authentication service to manage user access Consumes enterprise Role based Authorization service to manage permissions Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Application Service Layer (SOA): Consumes enterprise security Authentication service to manage user access Consumes enterprise Role-based Authorization (RBA) service to manage permissions

Consumes enterprise security Authentication service to manage user access Consumes enterprise Role based Authorization service to manage permissions Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Optimization models deployed on private cloud of 8 Linux servers provides a grid of computational resources Provides and consumes services to start and control CPLEX grid servers Application Service Layer (SOA):

Consumes enterprise security Authentication service to manage user access Consumes enterprise Role based Authorization service to manage permissions Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Real time messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer DB2 Enterprise Edition serves as transactional database and NCR Teradata as data warehouse Application Service Layer (SOA):

Consumes enterprise security Authentication service to manage user access Consumes enterprise Role based Authorization service to manage permissions Materialized views Stored procedures Triggers Index Partitions Table Partitions IBM DB2 EE Teradata JDBCJDBC RPCRPC RHEL Linux Grid Load balanced CPLEX Solver Tomcat server SOAP Web service VMware ESX Private Cloud Authentication Authorization SAML/SSO User Roles User Groups Application Security SOAPSOAP GIS application Realtime messaging Operations data Field information Maintenance data Interface Enterprise Apps RESTREST Services LayerServices Layer Services LayerServices Layer Provides locomotive location service to GIS system Consumes locomotive pre- assignments decisions from Field Operations Consumes real-time events reported by trains passing scanners and GPS beacon from locomotives Application Service Layer (SOA):

Hump Yard Simulation (YardSIM) Analyze yard capacity and evaluate the impact of changes in traffic pattern, infrastructure, resource, and operating policy. A Decision Support System: –Web Interfaces –Discrete-event Simulator –3-D Animation –Yard Layout Editor –Process Modeler and Rule Engine, and –What-if Scenario Management

Yard Simulation Architecture Scenario & Report Manager Database Train s Trains Consist Trip Plan Yard Layout Scenario Configuration Yard Operating Rules Reports Statistics Simulator & Optimizer UI (Browser) Application Database 3D Animator & Live Statistics View 1 3D Animator & Live Statistics View n Dispatcher & Client Manager Simulator & Optimizer

Built on the Discrete Event Framework 3D Animation using the JAVA 3D APIs. BRMS used for Rules, Workflow and Event Processing. Client-Server model with multiple clients connecting to the server in parallel Yard Simulation with 3D Animation

Yard Simulation Multiple View Windows Class Tracks Pullback Tracks Yard Top View Receiving Tracks

Operations Research GIS Dashboard Objective –Monitor real-time train status –Track locomotives and equipment Features: –Interactive GIS maps –Accessible through web browser –Train status summary –Train route display –Locomotive location and status –Locomotives due for maintenance –Equipment location and status

External Data SourcesClient MQ Series Locomotives (LARS) Tonnage Rating (Web Service) Trains & Schedule (OPD) Car Distribution (CDM) History (Teradata) Geo-Location Data Visualization BING Maps (Base Layer) NS BP Layers (Stations & Scanners) NS Core Layers (Rail Infrastructure) -Flare -Symbol -Chart -Star Burst -Route Renderers ESRI Flex API Mapping Services Proxy and Application Layer DNS – IP Clustered App and Web Servers App Server Weblogic 10G3 Web Server IPlanet App Server Weblogic 10G3 Web Server IPlanet AJAX Request Response (XML) GIS Server ArcGIS 10.3 Server REST Operations Research GIS Map Dashboard Architecture

Questions?