A modeling procedure for information and material flow analysis comprising graphical models, Rules and animated simulation

Abstract

The domain-specific modeling method SIMchronization was originally developed to analyze and optimize industrial maintenance supply chains. The use of graphical models extended with behavior-describing rules and combined with discrete simulation, reveals the dynamic interactions of supply chain elements, IT-systems, and the resulting information and material flows. This paper presents the basic meta-model and mechanisms of the modeling method and proposes a modeling procedure to achieve comprehensible supply chain models. Furthermore, this approach incorporates model verification, as the simulation algorithm requires syntactically correct and input-wise complete models, and the graphical flow animation enables practical verification by domain experts. A proof of concept illustrates the practicability of the approach which is discussed in a SWOT analysis.