Analysis and Evaluation Criteria

Abdul Samad Shibghatullah 133 30052008

6.2 Analysis and Evaluation Criteria

The analysis and evaluation of CRSMAS is based on the aims of the system. The objective of the system is to help supervisors to manage UE and, by doing so, to minimize the effect of UE upon crew schedules and hence to reduce the amount of disruptions to bus operation. Based on this aim the requirements for the selected tool have been identified, as discussed in Chapter Two. The requirement is for a tool that is capable of providing quick results in an uncertain environment. Based on this requirement MAS was chosen and CRSMAS proposed. To measure whether CRSMAS achieves its aim or not, two criteria have been identified, these are: rescheduling capability and rescheduling speed. The rescheduling capability is determined by the number of successful matches and the speed is evaluated based on the time taken to perform rescheduling. As mentioned in Chapter Three, the agents which in this research refer to CA and DA achieve their objective through negotiation between agents in Virtual World. There are two types of agents, the demand agent and the supply agent. In CRSMAS the demand agent is DA and the supply agent is CA. When a demand agent negotiates and finds a suitable supply agent that can fulfil its requirements then it is called “matched”. In CRSMAS when a duty DA loses its drivercrew because of UE then, through the Virtual World, the DA negotiates rescheduling process to find a suitable CA drivercrew that is available to take the duty. If there is a suitable CA then the match is a success. The matching process is done by CRSMAS. The perfect result is when 100 of the duties find a match. The speed is determined by the time it takes for the agent to find a match. The best result is the least time to find a match. The experiments single and multiple events are done to assess CRSMAS based on these criteria. In addition, the single event experiments objective is also to identify characteristics in crew schedules that influence the rescheduling capability, so that future crew schedules could be improved to increase their capability of finding crew replacements. The following section addresses the single and multiple event experiences presented in previous chapters, to be analysed and evaluated based on the above-mentioned criteria. Abdul Samad Shibghatullah 134 30052008

6.3 Analysis and Evaluation of Experimental Results