Choosing arrival process models for service systems: Tests of a nonhomogeneous Poisson process

Service systems such as call centers and hospital emergency rooms typically have strongly time‐varying arrival rates. Thus, a nonhomogeneous Poisson process (NHPP) is a natural model for the arrival process in a queueing model for performance analysis. Nevertheless, it is important to perform statistical tests with service system data to confirm that an NHPP is actually appropriate, as emphasized by Brown et al. [8]. They suggested a specific statistical test based on the Kolmogorov–Smirnov (KS) statistic after exploiting the conditional‐uniform (CU) property to transform the NHPP into a sequence of i.i.d. random variables uniformly distributed on [0,1] and then performing a logarithmic transformation of the data. We investigate why it is important to perform the final data transformation and consider what form it should take. We conduct extensive simulation experiments to study the power of these alternative statistical tests. We conclude that the general approach of Brown et al. [8] is excellent, but that an alternative data transformation proposed by Lewis [22], drawing upon Durbin [10], produces a test of an NHPP test with consistently greater power. We also conclude that the KS test after the CU transformation, without any additional data transformation, tends to be best to test against alternative hypotheses that primarily differ from an NHPP only through stochastic and time dependence. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 61: 66–90, 2014     

The impact of operational decisions on the design of salesforce incentives

When facing high levels of overstock inventories, firms often push their salesforce to work harder than usual to attract more demand, and one way to achieve that is to offer attractive incentives. However, most research on the optimal design of salesforce incentives ignores this dependency and assumes that operational decisions of production/inventory management are separable from design of salesforce incentives. We investigate this dependency in the problem of joint salesforce incentive design and inventory/production control. We develop a dynamic Principal‐Agent model with both Moral Hazard and Adverse Selection in which the principal is strategic and risk‐neutral but the agent is myopic and risk‐averse. We find the optimal joint incentive design and inventory control strategy, and demonstrate the impact of operational decisions on the design of a compensation package. The optimal strategy is characterized by a menu of inventory‐dependent salesforce compensation contracts. We show that the optimal compensation package depends highly on the operational decisions; when inventory levels are high, (a) the firm offers a more attractive contract and (b) the contract is effective in inducing the salesforce to work harder than usual. In contrast, when inventory levels are low, the firm can offer a less attractive compensation package, but still expect the salesforce to work hard enough. In addition, we show that although the inventory/production management and the design of salesforce compensation package are highly correlated, information acquisition through contract design allows the firm to implement traditional inventory control policies: a market‐based state‐dependent policy (with a constant base‐stock level when the inventory is low) that makes use of the extracted market condition from the agent is optimal. This work appears to be the first article on operations that addresses the important interplay between inventory/production control and salesforce compensation decisions in a dynamic setting. Our findings shed light on the effective integration of these two significant aspects for the successful operation of a firm. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 61: 320–340, 2014     

基于数据站场的系统效能评估决策支持方法

随着信息技术的发展,系统信息量的提升给军事系统效能评估带来了新的问题。针对系统效能分析数据非线性、高维数、强耦合的特点,提出了一种基于数据站场技术的效能评估决策支持方法。通过数据恢复、约减、求精与重构操作,对评估数据进行了处理,并搭建了数据站场立方体,降低了数据间的依赖性,满足了不同层面系统分析的需求。以面向任务的网络化火控系统的为例,进行了系统效能评估、时效性评估和指标分析,从三个层次验证了方法的有效性与可行性。将数据挖掘技术应用到仿真系统效能评估决策中,获得了更广泛的应用。     

正反向量子斯特林循环有限时间热力学性能界限和优化准则

研究了正反向量子斯特林循环的最优性能.在经典极限下,导出了循环的有限时间热力学性能界限和优化准则.得到了斯特林热机、制冷机和热泵特性参数之间的优化关系.     

考虑弹体动态特性的机动效率约束导引律

针对考虑交会角和过载约束导引律在大机动时能量损失大的问题,提出一种考虑导弹机动效率的多约束制导律。应用最优二次型原理推导出考虑一阶弹体延迟的时变导引系数闭环次优制导形式,将导弹机动时刻阻力系数引入时变权系数,并通过迭代确定机动效率约束边界。将时变约束表示成剩余时间与弹体延迟时间的函数,代入制导指令,进行弹道仿真。结果表明,对于常值与机动目标,文中制导律与过载约束导引律同只考虑交会角约束的导引律相比,对目标均能实现末端弹道成型要求,而考虑机动效率的制导指令分配更为合理,在避免指令加速度饱和的同时有效降低了拦截末端速度损耗,提高制导精度与毁伤效果。且该制导律中时变权系数无须配平求解,在保证精度的同时极大地提高了迭代速度。     

连续求解样本协方差矩阵迹的快速递推算法

为解决当样本数据不断增加时,利用传统方法反复计算样本协方差迹耗时多的缺点,提出了一种快速递推算法。理论分析和仿真试验都表明,算法的时间复杂度比传统的方法降低了一个数量级,从而大大减少了计算时间。     

Index policies for the routing of background jobs

Arriving (generic) jobs may be processed at one of several service stations, but only when no other (dedicated) jobs are waiting there. We consider the problem of how to route these incoming background jobs to make best use of the spare service capacity available at the stations. We develop an approximative approach to Whittle's proposal for restless bandits to obtain an index policy for routing. The indices concerned are increasing and nonlinear in the station workload. A numerical study testifies to the strong performance of the index policies developed. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004     

A balancing problem for mixed model assembly lines with a paced moving conveyor

We state a balancing problem for mixed model assembly lines with a paced moving conveyor as: Given the daily assembling sequence of the models, the tasks of each model, the precedence relations among the tasks, and the operations parameters of the assembly line, assign the tasks of the models to the workstations so as to minimize the total overload time. Several characteristics of the problem are investigated. A line‐balancing heuristic is proposed based on a lower bound of the total overload time. A practical procedure is provided for estimating the deviation of any given line‐balance solution from the theoretical optimum. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the methodology. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004.     

On the uncapacitated K‐commodity network design problem with zero flow‐costs

Extending Sastry's result on the uncapacitated two‐commodity network design problem, we completely characterize the optimal solution of the uncapacitated K‐commodity network design problem with zero flow costs for the case when K = 3. By solving a set of shortest‐path problems on related graphs, we show that the optimal solutions can be found in O(n³) time when K = 3, where n is the number of nodes in the network. The algorithm depends on identifying a list of “basic patterns”; the number of basic patterns grows exponentially with K. We also show that the uncapacitated K‐commodity network design problem can be solved in O(n³) time for general K if K is fixed; otherwise, the time for solving the problem is exponential. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics, 2004