Controlling the GI/M/1 queue by conditional acceptance of customers

In this paper we consider the problem of controlling the arrival of customers into a GI/M/1 service station. It is known that when the decisions controlling the system are made only at arrival epochs, the optimal acceptance strategy is of a control-limit type, i.e., an arrival is accepted if and only if fewer than n customers are present in the system. The question is whether exercising conditional acceptance can further increase the expected long run average profit of a firm which operates the system. To reveal the relevance of conditional acceptance we consider an extension of the control-limit rule in which the nth customer is conditionally admitted to the queue. This customer may later be rejected if neither service completion nor arrival has occurred within a given time period since the last arrival epoch. We model the system as a semi-Markov decision process, and develop conditions under which such a policy is preferable to the simple control-limit rule.     

A polling model with smart customers

In this paper we consider a single-server, cyclic polling system with switch-over times. A distinguishing feature of the model is that the rates of the Poisson arrival processes at the various queues depend on the server location. For this model we study the joint queue length distribution at polling epochs and at the server’s departure epochs. We also study the marginal queue length distribution at arrival epochs, as well as at arbitrary epochs (which is not the same in general, since we cannot use the PASTA property). A generalised version of the distributional form of Little’s law is applied to the joint queue length distribution at customer’s departure epochs in order to find the waiting time distribution for each customer type. We also provide an alternative, more efficient way to determine the mean queue lengths and mean waiting times, using Mean Value Analysis. Furthermore, we show that under certain conditions a Pseudo-Conservation Law for the total amount of work in the system holds. Finally, typical features of the model under consideration are demonstrated in several numerical examples.     

OPTIMAL CONTROL FOR A TANDEM NETWORK OF QUEUES WITH BLOCKING

1.IntroductionWeconsideratwo-stationtandemqueuewithnointermediatebuffer.Jobsatthefirststationmaybeblockedwhenthefollowingstationisoccupiedbyanotherjob.Thatis,ajobisblockedatstationoneuponservicecompletionifthefollowingstationisbeingoccupiedbyanotherjob.Afixedcostischargedforeveryenteringjob,forexample,thiscostcanbetheinputrawmaterialcostinamanufacturingsystem.Jobsinthesystemaresubjecttoaholdingcost.Arewardiscollectedwhenajobdepartsfromthesystem(i.e.,fromthesecondstation).Theproblemistocontro…     

An Application of Little's Result to the G/G/1 (LCFS/P) Queue

This paper considers a quite general single-server queueing system, under a last-come-first-served queue discipline, with pre-emption and arbitrary restarting policy. Expressions are given for the queue-size limiting distribution when the system is considered at arrival (or departure) epochs and in continuous time, by using very simple arguments.     

A note on some relations in the queue Glx/M/c

Closed-form relations are derived for the probabilities and performance measures observed at random/arrival/departure epochs in a multi-server queue with group arrivals.     

Optimality of routing and servicing in dependent parallel processing systems

In a system of dependent, parallel processing service stations, when is it optimal to route customers to the shortest queue and to devote auxiliary capacity to serve the longest queue? We show that this RSQ/SLQ policy is optimal for a wide class of Markovian systems, where the arrival and service rates at the stations, which may depend on the numbers of customers at all the stations, satisfy certain symmetry and monotonicity conditions. Under this policy, the queue lengths will be stochastically smaller in the weak submajorization ordering than the queue lengths under any other policy. Furthermore, this policy minimizes standard discounted and average cost functionals over finite and infinite horizons.     

The PH/PH/1 queue at epochs of queue size change

The PH/PH/1 queue is considered at embedded epochs which form the union of arrival and departure instants. This provides us with a new, compact representation as a quasi-birth-and-death process, where the order of the blocks is the sum of the number of phases in the arrival and service time distributions. It is quite easy to recover, from this new embedded process, the usual distributions at epochs of arrival, or epochs of departure, or at arbitrary instants. The quasi-birth-and-death structure allows for efficient algorithmic procedures. This revised version was published online in June 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

具有可变到达率的多重休假Geo~(λ_1,λ_2)/G/1排队分析

本文考虑顾客到达与服务员休假相关的多重休假离散时间排队系统,用更新过程及u-变换分析了系统的队长性质.分别得到系统在三种时点(n~-,n~+,n)处的队长分布的递推解,进而揭示了在不同到达率条件下系统队长分布不再具有随机分解特性,得到了系统在四种时点(n~-,n~+,n,离去时点D_n)处稳态队长分布的重要关系(不同于连续时间排队系统).     

The Infinite Server Queue with Arrivals Generated by a Non-Homogeneous Compound Poisson Process

This paper considers the infinite server queue with arrivals generated by a non-homogeneous compound Poisson process. In such a system, customers arrive in groups of variable size, the arrival epochs of groups being points of a non-homogeneous Poisson process, and they are served without delay. The service times of customers who belong to the same group need not be independent nor identically distributed. Assuming that the system is initially empty, the transient distribution of the queue size and of the counting departure process is obtained. Also the limiting queue size distribution (when it exists) is determined and it is found to be insensitive to the form the service time distribution functions.     

The infinite-buffer single server queue with a variant of multiple vacation policy and batch Markovian arrival process

We consider an infinite-buffer single server queue where arrivals occur according to a batch Markovian arrival process (BMAP). The server serves until system emptied and after that server takes a vacation. The server will take a maximum number H of vacations until either he finds at least one customer in the queue or the server has exhaustively taken all the vacations. We obtain queue length distributions at various epochs such as, service completion/vacation termination, pre-arrival, arbitrary, departure, etc. Some important performance measures, like mean queue lengths and mean waiting times, etc. have been obtained. Several other vacation queueing models like, single and multiple vacation model, queues with exceptional first vacation time, etc. can be considered as special cases of our model.     

Conditional and unconditional distributions forM/G/1 type queues with server vacations

M/G/1 queues with server vacations have been studied extensively over the last two decades. Recent surveys by Boxma [3], Doshi [5] and Teghem [14] provide extensive summary of literature on this subject. More recently, Shanthikumar [11] has generalized some of the results toM/G/1 type queues in which the arrival pattern during the vacations may be different from that during the time the server is actually working. In particular, the queue length at the departure epoch is shown to decompose into two independent random variables, one of which is the queue length at the departure epoch (arrival epoch, steady state) in the correspondingM/G/1 queue without vacations. Such generalizations are important in the analysis of situations involving reneging, balking and finite buffer cyclic server queues. In this paper we consider models similar to the one in Shanthikumar [11] but use the work in the system as the starting point of our investigation. We analyze the busy and idle periods separately and get conditional distributions of work in the system, queue length and, in some cases, waiting time. We then remove the conditioning to get the steady state distributions. Besides deriving the new steady state results and conditional waiting time and queue length distributions, we demonstrate that the results of Boxma and Groenendijk [2] follow as special cases. We also provide an alternative approach to deriving Shanthikumar's [11] results for queue length at departure epochs.     

The queue length distributions in the finite buffer bulk-service MAP/G/1 queue with multiple vacations

We consider a finite buffer batch service queueing system with multiple vacations wherein the input process is Markovian arrival process (MAP). The server leaves for a vacation as soon as the system empties and is allowed to take repeated (multiple) vacations. The service- and vacation- times are arbitrarily distributed. We obtain the queue length distributions at service completion, vacation termination, departure, arbitrary and pre-arrival epochs. Finally, some performance measures such as loss probability, average queue lengths are discussed. Computational procedure has been given when the service- and vacation- time distributions are of phase type (PH-distribution).     

Partial Pooling in Tandem Lines with Cooperation and Blocking

For a tandem line of finite, single-server queues operating under the production blocking mechanism, we study the effects of pooling several adjacent stations and the associated servers into a single station with a single team of servers. We assume that the servers are cross-trained (so that they can work at several different stations) and that two or more servers can cooperate on the same job. For such a system, we provide sufficient conditions on the service times and sizes of the input and output buffers at the pooled station under which pooling will decrease the departure time of each job from the system (and hence increase the system throughput). We also show that pooling decreases the total number of jobs in the system at any given time and the sojourn time of each job in the system if the departure time of each job from the system is decreased by pooling and there is an arrival stream at the first station. Moreover, we provide sufficient conditions under which pooling will improve the holding cost of each job in the system incurred before any given time, and extend our results to closed tandem lines and to queueing networks with either a more general blocking mechanism or probabilistic routing. Finally, we present a numerical study aimed at quantifying the improvements in system performance obtained through pooling and at understanding which stations should be pooled to achieve the maximum benefit. Our results suggest that the improvements gained by pooling may be substantial and that the bottleneck station should be among the pooled stations in order to obtain the greatest benefit. AMS subject classification: 90B22     

Performance Analysis of a Finite-Buffer Bulk-Arrival and Bulk-Service Queue with Variable Server Capacity

Abstract

In this paper, we consider a finite-buffer bulk-arrival and bulk-service queue with variable server capacity: M ^X /G ^Y /1/K + B. The main purpose of this paper is to discuss the analytic and computational aspects of this system. We first derive steady-state departure-epoch probabilities based on the embedded Markov chain method. Next, we demonstrate two numerically stable relationships for the steady-state probabilities of the queue lengths at three different epochs: departure, random, and arrival. Finally, based on these relationships, we present various useful performance measures of interest such as moments of the number of customers in the queue at three different epochs, the loss probability, and the probability that server is busy. Numerical results are presented for a deterministic service-time distribution – a case that has gained importance in recent years.     

Admission control and pricing in a queue with batch arrivals

We investigate a problem of admission control in a queue with batch arrivals. We consider a single server with exponential service times and a compound Poisson arrival process. Each arriving batch computes its expected benefit and decides whether or not to enter the system. The controller’s problem is to set state dependent prices for arriving batches. Once prices have been set we formulate the admission control problem, derive properties of the value function, and obtain the optimal admission policy.     

M/G/1 queue with event-dependent arrival rates

Motivated by experiments on customers’ behavior in service systems, we consider a queueing model with event-dependent arrival rates. Customers’ arrival rates depend on the last event, which may either be a service departure or an arrival. We derive explicitly the performance measures and analyze the impact of the event-dependency. In particular, we show that this queueing model, in which a service completion generates a higher arrival rate than an arrival, performs better than a system in which customers are insensitive to the last event. Moreover, contrary to the M/G/1 queue, we show that the coefficient of variation of the service does not necessarily deteriorate the system performance. Next, we show that this queueing model may be the result of customers’ strategic behavior when only the last event is known. Finally, we investigate the historical admission control problem. We show that, under certain conditions, a deterministic policy with two thresholds may be optimal. This new policy is easy to implement and provides an improvement compared to the classical one-threshold policy.     

Analysis of a Fork/Join Synchronization Station with Inputs from Coxian Servers in a Closed Queuing Network

Fork/join stations are commonly used to model the synchronization constraints in queuing models of computer networks, fabrication/assembly systems and material control strategies for manufacturing systems. This paper presents an exact analysis of a fork/join station in a closed queuing network with inputs from servers with two-phase Coxian service distributions, which models a wide range of variability in the input processes. The underlying queue length and departure processes are analyzed to determine performance measures such as throughput, distributions of the queue length and inter-departure times from the fork/join station. The results show that, for certain parameter settings, variability in the arrival processes has a significant impact on system performance. The model is also used to study the sensitivity of performance measures such as throughput, mean queue lengths, and variability of inter-departure times for a wide range of input parameters and network populations.     

Performance analysis of a discrete-time Geo/G/1 queue with randomized vacations and at most J vacations

This paper presents the analysis of a discrete-time Geo/G/1$\mathit{Geo}/G/1$ queue with randomized vacations. Using the probability decomposition theory and renewal process, two variants on this model, namely the late arrival system with delayed access (LAS-DA) and early arrival system (EAS), have been examined. For both the cases, recursive solution for queue length distributions at arbitrary, just before a potential arrival, pre-arrival, immediately after potential departure, and outside observer’s observation epochs are obtained. Further, various performance measures such as potential blocking probability, turned-on period, turned-off period, vacation period, expected length of the turned-on circle period, average queue length and sojourn time, etc. have been presented. It is hoped that the results obtained in this paper may provide useful information to designers of telecommunication systems, practitioners, and others.