1. Simulation study: waterfall approach Phases: - Requirements analysis - Model construction (conceptual) - Model implementation (tool) - Validation & Verification - Experimenting - Statistical analysis - Reporting Iteration may be necessary at several points

2. More details: Simulation handbook (later) In this course we stress modeling with Arena tool, however we may NEVER start modeling without any analysis. The model depends upon the questions that need an answer. Without them you risk modeling both too much and too little! Also it is better to construct models conceptually, i.e. without an explicit tool in mind. Conceptual model can be realized by simulation or stochastic model or differently.

3. Conceptual modeling for logistics: Petri nets are well versed Transitions represent actions Tokens represent objects Places represent object kinds Actions consume and produce certain objects Realization: Arena Current version 5.0 and higher (eval version) License being negociated TUE has license for old version with considerably different UI.

4. Arena user interface based on MS Visio Drag and drop predefined shapes in model then connect shapes model Several sets

5. Basic Arena building blocks: create destroy assign (values to variables) process resource (descriptions) record (certain simulation results) …. (many more) In Arena book start with construction of simple model (Ch. 4)