Defining a schedule with no calendar mapping
Time units
view is used when there is no mapping to calendar dates. Schedule intervals/moments are defined simply as number of time units (milliseconds, seconds, minutes, hours, days, or weeks) passed from the model start. Define schedule in this view
when only interval durations are important, not the exact calendar times.
This view is convenient e.g. for defining maintenance intervention times, failures, etc. of various devices.
Let's study how to define the device maintenance intervention times using the schedule in the
Custom (no calendar mapping)
view. Assume that maintenance is held irrelatively of calendar time, after 50 operational hours. Maintenance lasts 2 hours.
Define device maintenance times using the schedule in the Time units view
- Drag the
Schedule
element from the
Agent
palette on the graphical diagram of the agent.
- Go to the
Properties
view.
- Specify the name of the element in the
Name
field. This name will be used later on for accessing the schedule from AnyLogic object(s) properties, or programmatically from code.
- Go to the
Data
section of the schedule properties. Choose the type of the value that will be controlled by this schedule from the
Type
group of buttons:
on/off,
integer, or
real. In our case we need just to define how the device status changes from available (on) to unavailable (off) during the maintenance, so leave the default option
on/off
selected.
- Choose the schedule mode - whether it defines intervals or discrete time moments. Choose the option
Intervals (Start, End)
from the group of buttons
The schedule defines.
- Choose the most convenient view for your task - in our case it is
Custom (no calendar mapping), so choose this option from the
Duration type
group of buttons.
- Specify the recurrence of the schedule in the
Repeat every...
field. In our case the full cycle composes 50 2 = 52 hours. Therefore type
52
and choose
hours
there.
- In the
Default value
field you can specify the default value for the schedule - the value that will be used for the intervals not defined in the schedule. In our case it makes no sense, since we will define the whole lifecycle for the device. Leave the default value
unchanged.
- Leave
List of ranges
selected. Define intervals in the table below. Each interval is defined in a separate row of the table. Add new row in the table by clicking the
button to the right of the table. Define
Start
and
End
times for this interval and the value that will correspond to this interval, in the
Value
cell. First, we want to define operational interval - so, leave
0
as
Start, type
50
as interval's
End
and leave
on
as its
Value.
- Now define one more interval corresponding to maintenance hours. Add one more row in the table as described above. Specify
50
as
Start
time of this interval,
52
as the
End
and click in the
Value
cell to change its state from
on
to
off.
You may delete any intervals from the table and move them in the table up and down (in this case you should contain the schedule integrity by yourself). This can be done by selecting the row in the table and then using the corresponding buttons
,
and
to the right of the table.
- If you want to shift the schedule in time anyhow (so that its start moment will correspond not to the start of the model, but to some other moment of model time), you can choose this particular moment in the
Snap to
control (here you define it again as the number of selected time units passed from the model start).
You can
preview
the schedule in the convenient way that is commonly used in digital diaries, organizers, and office software tools. Just open the
Preview
properties page of the schedule and check whether the schedule defines the desired behavior:
When finished with defining the schedule, you may use it in your model by referring to it in the properties of required objects, and/or programmatically using the corresponding
functions
of the schedule.
See also
Schedule
Weekly schedule
Schedule with N Days/Weeks duration
Schedule exceptions
Schedule API
Schedule preview