Timeout Triggered Event

Timeout triggered event is used when you need to perform an action at some particular moment of time (or on some particular date). Such an event occurs exactly in Timeout time after it is started.

Timeout triggered event has several work modes, allowing the user to efficiently solve various tasks, e.g.:

Scheduling periodic events. Cyclic event mode enables the user to perform some actions periodically, e.g. every morning, or quarterly. Use cyclic events in synchronous models.
The figure below shows the simplest example of a cyclic event performing some action after each model time unit:

Another (probably, more illustrative) use case. Let's assume we need to perform some actions at the start of a new shift (at 8 A.M.) in a factory model. Such behavior can be easily implemented using a cyclic event. In this case, if your model time units are hours, you simply specify 8 as the First occurrence time (absolute) and 24 as the Recurrence time.

Cyclic event can deal with calendar dates as well. In this case you specify the calendar date, when you want this event to occur for the first time, and specify the event's Recurrence time (here you can use AnyLogic time functions (second(), minute(), hour(), day(), week()), returning time values, according to the current time unit setting). For example, to set up a weekly event, type there week().

Scheduling some action at the very beginning of simulation. You may need to perform some actions just at the very beginning of the simulation, but after the agent's Startup code is already performed. Such the behavior can be implemented using the Occurs once event mode and the Timeout set to 0.
Scheduling some action at particular time moment from the present situation. This kind of behavior can be implemented using the User control event mode. Such the event is manually controlled by the user via its API. To schedule a event, you call its function restart(), specifying the timeout value as a parameter:

If you expect several events, performing similar actions, to be scheduled at the same time, use dynamic events instead of events.

To add a timeout triggered event

Drag the Event element from the Agent palette onto the graphical diagram of agent.
Once the event is created, you can specify its name in the text line editor opened on the right of the element in the graphical editor. When finished, press Enter and go to the Properties view.
Choose Timeout from the Trigger type drop-down list.
Specify the event’s action in the Action section. There you can write Java code to be executed on the event occurrence. Probably it would be more convenient to define this code as a function and just place the function call here.
Choose the the event mode from the Mode drop-down list:
- User control – the event will work in manual mode. It will occur if and only if user calls the event’s restart() function passing the timeout as the argument, for instance myEvent.restart(15).
  If the timeout is fixed and known beforehand, you can define it once in the Timeout property and simply call myEvent.restart() without specifying the timeout as a function parameter.
- Occurs once – the event will occur only once exactly in the specified Occurrence time (absolute) or Occurence date. You can define the occurrence time as a calendar date (choose Use calendar dates) or as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start (choose Use model time).
  Please note that here you define the absolute time and in the case the event will be created after the specified time, it will never occur.
- Cyclic – the event will occur cyclically. Using the controls below, you define the First occurrence time (absolute) or Occurrence date and the Recurrence time for an event. The first occurrence time can be defined either as a calendar date (choose Use calendar dates), or as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start (choose Use model time).
  Please note that you define absolute times. If event will be created after the specified first occurrence time, the model will schedule the first occurrence time in the past and then will successively increment it with Recurrence time. The first time that will exceed the current model time will be used as the actual first occurrence time. The next occurrence times will be counted as it should be by adding the defined Recurrence time.
  If you want to use relative times (i.e. count the first occurrence time from the moment this event will be created), use the time() function in the First occurrence time (absolute) property. time() will refer to the moment this event was created at.

Properties

General properties

Name – The name of the event. The name is used to identify and access the event.

Show name – If selected, the name of the event is displayed on a presentation diagram.

Ignore – If selected, the event is excluded from the model.

Visible - If selected, the event is visible on a presentation at runtime.

Trigger type – The event's trigger type:

Timeout – The event is timeout triggered. The event occurs according to the chosen Mode.

Rate – The event is rate triggered. The event occurs with the specified Rate.

Condition – The event is condition triggered. The event occurs when the specified boolean Condition becomes true.

Mode – [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout] Choose here the mode of the timeout triggered event:

User control – The event will work in manual mode. It will occur only when the user calls the event’s restart function passing the timeout as the argument, for instance myEvent.restart(15).
If the timeout is fixed, you can define it once in the Timeout property and simply call myEvent.restart() without specifying the timeout as a function parameter.

Occurs once – The event will occur only once exactly in the specified (absolute) or Occurence date. You can define the occurrence time as a calendar date (choose Use calendar dates) or as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start (choose Use model time).
Please note that here you define the absolute time and in the case the event will be created after the specified time, it will never occur.

Cyclic – The event will occur cyclically. You define the First occurrence time (absolute) or Occurrence date and the Recurrence time for an event. The first occurrence time can be defined either as a calendar date (choose Use calendar dates), or as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start (choose Use model time).
Please note that you define absolute times. If you want to use relative times (i.e. count the first occurrence time from the moment this event will be created), use time() function in the First occurrence time (absolute) property. time() will refer to the moment this event was created at..

Timeout – [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout and Mode is User control] The expression evaluating the timeout that should pass from the moment when the user starts the event by calling its restart() function.

Use model time - [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout and Mode is Occurs once or Cyclic] If selected, the event will occur at the specified model time.

Use calendar dates - [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout and Mode is Occurs once or Cyclic] If selected, the event will occur at the specified calendar date.

Occurrence time (absolute) – [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout, Mode is Occurs once and Use model time is selected] The absolute time of event occurrence defined as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start.

Occurence date - [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout, Mode is Occurs once or Cyclic and Use calendar dates is selected] The calendar date and time of the event.

First occurrence time (absolute) – [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout, Mode is Cyclic and Use model time is selected] The absolute time of the first occurrence of the cyclic event, defined as a number of model time units to be passed from the model start.

Recurrence time – [Visible if Trigger type is Timeout and Mode is Cyclic] The recurrence time of the cyclic event.

Rate – [Visible if Trigger type is Rate] The rate triggering the event. Event will occur with the timeout distributed exponentially with the parameter rate. I.e. if the rate is 5, event will occur on average 5 times per time unit.

Condition – [Visible if Trigger type is Condition] The condition triggering the event. Event will occur when the specified Boolean expression is true.

Log to database – If selected, information on all event occurrences will be logged into the model execution log events_log.

Action

Java code to be executed on event occurrence.

Controlling events manually

You can control the timeout triggered event programmatically via its API

boolean isActive() - Returns true, if the event is currently scheduled, false otherwise.

void reset() - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any. In case the event is Cyclic, the cycle would not resume until restart() or restart(double t) is called.

void restart() - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence according to the Timeout specified.

void restart(double timeout) - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence in time timeout. Timeout is specified in model time units.
If the event is Cyclic, it will then continue occurring at the original timeout/rate.
Parameter: timeout - time (from the function call moment), in which the event will be scheduled.

void restart(double timeout, TimeUnits units) - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence in time timeout. Timeout is specified in given time units.
If the event is Cyclic, it will then continue occurring at the original timeout/rate.
Parameters: timeout - time (from the function call moment), in which the event will be scheduled.
units - time unit constant
Example: event.restart(10, MINUTE) schedules event occurrence in 10 minutes from the current moment of model time.

void restartTo(double time) - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence at the absolute model time time. Timeout is specified in model time units. If the event is Cyclic, it will then continue occurring at the original timeout/rate.
This method looks similar to the restart(time - time()) call but it is actually different because it eliminates numeric calculation error which may occur on any machine.
Parameter: time - model time (absolute), at which the event will be scheduled.

void restartTo(double time, TimeUnits units) - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence at the absolute model time time. Timeout is specified in given time units. If the event is Cyclic, it will then continue occurring at the original timeout/rate.
This method seems to be like the call restart(time - time()) but it is different because it eliminates numeric calculation error which may occur on any machine.
Parameters: time - model time (absolute), at which the event will be scheduled.
units - time unit constant

void restartTo(Date date) - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and schedules the next occurrence at the model date date. If the event is Cyclic, it will then continue occurring at the original timeout/rate.
This method seems to be like the call restart(toTimeoutInCalendar(...)) but it is different because it eliminates numeric calculation error which may occur on any machine.
Parameter: date - model date, at which the event will be scheduled.

void suspend() - Cancels the currently scheduled event, if any, and remembers the remaining time so that it can be resumed by calling resume(). If the event is not scheduled at the time of calling suspend(), the subsequent resume will result in nothing.
Note that you should not call this function (i.e. should not try to suspend the event) from its own action code: it will have the effect of reset().

void resume() - Re-schedules the previously suspended event in the remaining time. Does nothing if event was never suspended or was reset or restarted after it was last suspended.

double getRest() - Returns the time remaining before the scheduled occurrence of the event, in model time units.
If the event is not scheduled, the function returns infinity .

double getRest(TimeUnits units) - Returns the time remaining before the scheduled occurrence of the event, in given time units.
If the event is not scheduled, the function returns infinity .
Parameter: units - time unit constant
Example: event.getRest(MINUTE) will return the remaining time in minutes.

Timeout Triggered Event

Properties

Controlling events manually

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