| Setting | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Model Type | run_forecast | Model type to run |
| Number of Modelling Periods | 30 | Number of modelling periods |
| Initial Calendar Epoch | 2024 | Initial Calendar Epoch |
| Budget Sheet to Use | budget_current | Tag to identify the Budget to use. Must match one of the sheets in your Project Setup file |
| Maximum Treatments per Period | 99999 | Maximum number of Non-Routine Treatments allowed in any one period. This will override budget constraints. Currently only used in MCDA model. |
| Feedback Mode | Chatty | Determines how much feedback is shown at runtime while a model runs |
| Discount Rate | 4 | Discount Rate for calculating Present Value of future costs, in Percent |
| Inflation Rate | 4 | Inflation Rate for calculating Present Value of future costs, in Percent |
| Minimum Treatment Suitability Score | 0 | Minimum Treatent Suitability Score (TSS). If TSS is below this value, treatment will not trigger. |
| Cost Scaling Parameter | file_length | Name of column in input file used to Scale Costs (e.g. 'in_length' or 'in_areaM2') or None for no scaling |
| BCA-Optimisation Method | bca-ibcr | Optimisation method to use for BCA optimisation |
| Objective Parameter | para_obj_auc | Name of the model parameter that represents the Objective to optimise |
| Number of Look-Ahead Periods | 30 | Number of Look-Ahead Periods |
| Trigger Routine Maintenance | TRUE | TRUE/FALSE flag to indicate if the model should trigger Routine Maintenance |
| Routine Maintenance Treatment | RMaint | Name of the treatment that represents Routine Maintenance. Must match exactly one of your Domain Model treatments (case-sensitive) |
| Trigger Resets when Routine Maintenance | FALSE | TRUE/FALSE flag to indicate if Routine Maintenance treatments should be exported with the FWP |
| Include Maintenance in FWP Export | FALSE | TRUE/FALSE flag to indicate if Routine Maintenance triggers Resets |
| Element Identifier Columns | file_section_id|file_seg_name|file_loc_from|file_loc_to | Pipe-delimited list of input column names to export with parameter forecasts and treatments |
| Parameters to Export (or 'all' for All) | all | Pipe-delimited list of Model Parameters to export, or enter 'all' to export forecasts for all parameters |
| Export Long Format File | FALSE | TRUE/FALSE flag to indicate if parameter forecasts should be exported in long file format (may cause out-of-memory errors) |
| Strategy Debug Element Index | -1 | Zero-based index for the element on which to Debug/Check strategy costs and benefits. Enter -1 to skip this debug. |
| Strategy Debug Period | -1 | Modelling period for which to export Strategy debug information. Enter -1 to skip this debug |
| Period for Treatment Candidate Set Debug | 5 | Modelling period for which to export Candidate Treatment set for checking/debugging purposes. Enter -1 to skip this debug. |
Model Configurations
Overview
A model configuration is a set of settings with specified values. A configuration controls key aspects of your model run, such as:
Number of modelling periods
Model Type
Budget to use
Inflation or Discount Rates to use
Typically, you will want to use more than one configuration during a modelling analysis. For example, a configuration determines which budget constraint set your model will use. Therefore, if you want to explore three different budgets, you will need three separate configurations. You will be prompted to choose the configuration to use just before you start a model run.
Some settings in the model configuration are not often modified or used. For example, the setting with key ‘Trigger Routine Maintenance’ controls whether or not Routine Maintenance is triggered after the optimisation module has selected which treatments to apply. You will typically use the same setting (true or false) for all your model configurations.
Thus, most of the configuration settings do not have to be changed for each model variation you want to run. Rather, you will just be wanting to modify three or four key parameters in each configuration.
For this reason, you can define a Base Configuration which contains the general settings to use for ALL configurations. You can then create more specific configurations that will override certain specified properties in the base configuraiton at run time.
Base Configuration
The base configuration needs to be specified in the ‘base_config’ sheet of your Work Bench file. The table below shows all of the properties that can be configured in the base configuration:
Important
The table shown above must have left-upper corner in cell A1 of the ‘base_config’ sheet. You can use the cells below or to the right of the table but it is recommended that you rather make use of a seperate sheet to keep any notes etc.
Do NOT change column names or the names of the parameters in the ‘Settings’ column.
Custom Configurations
As explained above, a custom configuration is duplicate of the Base Configuration in which you then override one or more properties. You should use short, descriptive names for custom configurations. Custom configurations should be stored in the Work Bench file on sheets prefixed with ‘config_’.
For example, if you want to namy your configuration as ‘current’ then you should place the properties to override on sheet ‘config_current’ in your Work Bench file. You will then be prompted at run-time to select the configuration or configurations to use.
Figure 1 shows how you will select the configuration to run for a single model run, while Figure 2 shows how you can select multiple-configurations for a multi-model run using parallel processing.
The table below shows how you will specify the properties you want to override in a custom configuration:
| Setting | Value | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Model Type | mcda_optimised | Model type to run |
| Number of Modelling Periods | 30 | Number of modelling periods |
| Initial Calendar Epoch | 2024 | Initial Calendar Epoch |
| Budget Sheet to Use | budget_current | Tag to identify the Budget to use. Must match one of the sheets in your Budget Setup file |
| Maximum Treatments per Period | 900 | Maximum number of Non-Routine Treatments allowed in any one period. This will override budget constraints. Currently only used in MCDA model. |