A research prototype implementation has been evolving for several years in parallel with the vision, theory, language, and applicative aspects of structured modeling. The objective of this article is to describe the capabilities of this implementation as it now stands, and to comment on how it contributes toward fulfilling a previously published agenda for the development of a new generation of modeling environments. The intended audience is all modeling system designers and evaluators, including those who do not happen to take a structured modeling approach.

FW/SM: A Prototype Structured Modeling Environment

This is the second of two articles on the principal features of SML, a language for expressing structured models. The prior article covered levels 1 and 2. The present article covers the remaining levels, with special attention to the characteristics of SML that, collectively, make it unique. The intended audience includes evaluators of other modeling languages, designers of modeling languages and systems, and those following the development of structured modeling.

The SML language for structured modeling: levels 3 and 4

The introduction of new technologies and concepts has redefined the relative positioning of information systems (IS) and decision technologies in a corporate context. Corporate IS have been extended to include not only transaction processing databases but also analytical databases, often known as Data Warehouses. On-line analytical processing (OLAP), as introduced by Codd et al. [E.F. Codd, S.B Codd, C.T. Salley, Providing On-Line Analytical Processing to User–Analysts: An IT Mandate, E.F. Codd and Associates, 1993], is capable of capturing the structure of the real world data in the form of multidimensional tables which are known as `datacubes' by management information systems (MIS) and statistical systems specialists. Manipulation and presentation of such information through multidimensional views and graphical displays provide invaluable support for the decision-maker. We illustrate the natural coupling, which exists between data modelling, symbolic modelling and `What if' analysis phases of a decision support system (DSS). In particular, we explore the power of roll-up and drill-down features of OLAP and show how these translate into aggregation and disagreggation of the underlying decision models. Our approach sets out a paradigm for analysing the data, applying DSS tools and progressing through the information value chain to create organisational knowledge.

Adapting on-line analytical processing for decision modelling: the interaction of information and decision technologies

In many application domains, optimisation and other analytic models are often embedded as a decision engine within the respective business processes. In this paper, we study recent trends in the provision of optimisation tools and optimisation-based decision support systems (DSS) as web-enabled distributed applications. We analyse the evolution from the Application Service Provision (ASP) model to the e-Services model, and we illustrate the importance of distributed optimisation components in the effective deployment of embedded ''business analytics''. We finally provide an overview of the OSP and the WEBOPT projects, which deliver optimisation-based applications and optimisation components in a distributed environment.

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The evolution of web-based optimisation: From ASP to e-Services

https://bura.brunel.ac.uk/bitstream/2438/2328/1/TR_03_92.pdf

Tools for reformulating logical forms into zero-one mixed integer programs

UIMP is a matrix-generator report-writer system designed to aid the reahzation (generation) of mathematical programming models and also the analysis-reporting of the solutions of such models The data-structure facility of the system allows the underlying structure of a user model to be captured and helps to define such models This data-structure feature is not only a powerful modeling aid, it also finds use in the analysis of solutions and report generation The experience of using the system, its shortcomings, and possible extensions are also discussed.

E. F. D. Ellison

Papers

UIMP: User Interface for Mathematical Programming