Industrial production is one of the most basic human activities indispensable to the economic activity. Due to its complexity, production is not very well understood and modeled as opposed to traditional fields of inquiry such as physics. This book aims at enhancing rigorous understanding of a particular area of production, that of analysis and optimization of production lines and networks using discrete event models and simulation. To our knowledge, this is the first book treating this subject from the point of view mentioned above. We have arrived at the realization that discrete event...

This book is concerned with a most important area of industrial production, that of analysis and optimization of production lines and networks using discrete-event models and simulation. The book introduces a novel approach that combines analytic models and discrete-event simulation. Unlike conventional piece-by-piece simulation, this method observes a reduced number of events between which the evolution of the system is tracked analytically. Using this hybrid approach, several models are developed for the analysis of production lines and networks. The hybrid approach combines speed and...