OR/MS Today articles from April 2004

OR/MS Today archives from April 2004

International entrepreneurs.(InsideStory)
April 1, 2004... Welcome to the annual Special International Issue of OR/MS Today, the seventh in a series aimed at giving readers a taste of the wide world of operations wherever it happens to be practiced or preached. As with our previous international OR...

Academic/practitioner cooperation, Part 2: what to do about it?(President'sDesk)
April 1, 2004... My first presidential column dealt with why academic/practitioner interaction is vital and why it is hard. This column will discuss some things that INFORMS is or should be doing about it. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Our journals are vital...

Online grocery stores, Part II.(Cyberspace)
April 1, 2004... How should we deliver groceries for an online order? Five years ago, in the June 1999 issue of this column, I wrote about different supply chain models for online grocery stores illustrating with Peapod, Groceronline, Planet-Organics and...

The trouble with ROI.(Was It Something I Said?)
April 1, 2004... When we left off last time, I had just finished ranting about the first salesperson who came rolling into my presence with a slick return-on-investment model and tried to shove it down our throat in order to somehow close a deal before the...

Decision-support systems development: an essential part of OR education.(Issues in Education)
April 1, 2004... Equipped with the modeling and algorithmic skills taught in the standard OR curriculum, Susan is ready to solve real-world problems. With a knowledge and understanding of theory and applications of mathematical programming, simulation...

The restaurant critic's parable.(Oracle)
April 1, 2004... "What a great meal!" the OR/MS analyst beamed, looking once again around the elegant French restaurant as his wife sipped her after-dinner coffee. "I see why you think so highly of this place." The restaurant critic smiled broadly. "Yes,...

Bringing home the Bronze: Army captain awarded for operations research efforts in Iraq.(RealWorld)(Cover Story)
April 1, 2004... When Allison Stewart jumped down from a Chinook helicopter to the sizzling tarmac of Baghdad International Airport last June, she never guessed the would leave three short months later with a Bronze Star stuffed in her backpack. Only a week...

A fortnight in Bellagio.(Viewpoint)
April 1, 2004... From March 10-23, we were in residence at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Study and Conference Center located in Bellagio on Lake Como in northern Italy. The Bellagio Center opened in 1959 to allow scholars, scientists, artists and...

Democracy in operation: voting, technology and OR; Electronic voting and data analyses-driven redistricting raise new questions over the sanctity of the election process.(Forum)(Editorial)
April 1, 2004... IN HIS LECTURE TO THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL Conference on Operational Research, Philip Morse laid out the range of concerns that a science of OR would cover. This science would investigate "operations" as mathematical abstractions in order to...

The name game: time to move forward.(Letters to the Editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... To the Editor: Mathieu Balez raises some excellent points on "naming the profession" in the February issue of OR/MS Today ("Operations Research Gives Profession a Bad Name," 2004, OR/MS Today, Vol. 31, No. 1, p. 21). It's hard to argue...

What's in a name?(Letters to the Editor)(Letter to the Editor)
April 1, 2004... To the Editor: Would that which we call OR by any other name smell as sweet? I picked up my copy of February 2004 OR/MS Today with more than the usual high degree of eager anticipation. In the previous edition, I'd been excited at the...

Post-modern OR: "Knowledge Leveraging" provides the architecture for the fast-emerging, worldwide information economy.(International OR)(operations research)
April 1, 2004... IN SOME QUARTERS TODAY, ONE WILL HEAR THE science of operations research described as a discipline of yesteryear, a sort of dusty if useful set of theoretical tools dating from World War II. It is almost a quarter century since Russ Ackoff...

Online optimization: from logistics to business intelligence, German company's "family of products" takes aim at complex problems.(International OR)
April 1, 2004... IN 1967, WHEN I RETURNED TO GERMANY FROM the United States to become the chairman of the newly founded Operations Research Department at the Aachen Institute of Technology, the literature was full of claims that OR was already dead [1]. The...

Home care operations: growing population of senior citizens presents interesting OR problem in Sweden and throughout the Western world.(International OR)
April 1, 2004... THE PROVISION OF HIGH QUALITY SOCIAL CARE for the elderly is a growing concern throughout the Western world. Home care for elderly people is quite an anonymous operation for many OR professionals. There may be many reasons for this, but the...

Altitude manpower planning: an integrated system that addresses the puzzle of planning a crew force.(International OR)
April 1, 2004... MANPOWER PLANNING IS A FUNDAMENTAL process of an airline's operations. Montreal-based AD OPT Technologies Inc. has tackled this challenging process in its Altitude Manpower Planning system. One of the most critical aspects of operating an...

Business process excellence & OR: the practical application of OR in various phases of business process lifecycle management is supported through the concept of the "business process factory.".(International OR)
April 1, 2004... While OR and business process excellence may not be closely related on the first glance, a further examination shows that both have clear interdependencies. OR can be an enabler of process excellence. While initially this was especially true...

Impact Explorer[TM]: audience response system for opinion gathering.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Impact Explorer[TM] uses a wireless keypad system to gather the opinions of a group about important issues. Impact Explorer allows up to 250 people to vote on and rank ideas and suggestions and to apply matrix assessment (such as probability vs...

Frontier Analyst[R]: efficiency and performance measurement.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Banxia[R] Frontier Analyst[R] is a proven tool that gives you detailed insights into how your business units are performing, so that you can quickly identify and target those critical areas which will have the greatest impact on improved...

Distribution fitting software.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Stat::Fit[R] statistically fits your data to the most useful analytical distribution. Version 2 includes 11 additional distributions and enhanced graphics capabilities. The Auto::Fit function automatically fits continuous and discrete...

Logical Decisions[R] for Windows[TM].(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Logical Decisions[R] for Windows[TM], Version 5.1 helps you evaluate choices requiring critical preference and value judgements. LDW lets you combine qualitative and quantitative concerns in a single model. LDW also lets you simultaneously...

CSIM 19 is now available!(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Need to build models of highly complex systems? CSIM, the world's preferred low-cost simulation tool, just got even better. Using the popular C and C++ languages, this advanced simulation toolkit enables you to create process-oriented, discrete...

Micro Saint Sharp: everything you need in simulation!(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Built off the successful Micro Saint engine, but completely redesigned to be faster, modular and more powerful! Micro Saint Sharp is a general purpose, discrete-event simulation software tool that can simulate complex processes in a variety of...

@RISK.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... @RISK is the risk analysis add-in for Microsoft Excel. Using Monte Carlo simulation, @RISK will tell you not only what could happen, but how likely it is to happen. Used by OR practitioners for everything from customer service to forecasting to...

StatTools.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... The new statistical analysis add-in for Microsoft Excel, StatTools replaces Excel's statistics functions with a new set of robust, accurate functions. Stop exporting your data to perform statistical analysis! Now you do all of your...

DEA SolverPro.(Literature Files 2004)(Data Envelopment Analysis)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... DEA SolverPro is a user-friendly Excel-based DEA (Data Envelopment Analysis) tool. With popular demands on additional features, DEA SolverPro Version 4.1 is now available. The version 4.0 users can download it free, while older version users...

Count on Arena for enterprise-wide simulation.(Literature Files 2004)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Arena[R] simulation software offers the unparalleled ease-of-use, flexibility, and domain expertise required for modeling any aspect of a business enterprise. The Arena product family supports both in-depth analyses of a particular functional...

The Science of Better: progress report on the Informs initiative to market our profession.(Informs News)
April 1, 2004... Our "OR: The Science of Better" campaign is about to move into a new phase. Later this spring, INFORMS will premiere two new Web sites. Make sure to bookmark www.orchampions.org, the champion's kit for INFORMS members; and...

Notes from the Roundtable.(Informs News)(Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences)
April 1, 2004... Atlanta -- Fall 2003: The Roundtable had a very successful meeting at the Fall INFORMS Conference in Atlanta, and many members of CPMS joined the Roundtable for the Saturday evening reception, dinner and keynote presentation, in which Phil...

2004 Informs Combined Colloquia.(Informs News)(Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences )
April 1, 2004... The 2004 INFORMS Combined Colloquia will be held Oct. 22-23, the Friday and Saturday immediately preceding the INFORMS Annual Meeting in Denver. This year, the Combined Colloquia will feature the Sixth Teaching Effectiveness Colloquium, the...

Call for nominations.(Informs News)(Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences)
April 1, 2004... INFORMS Fellows The Fellow Award recognizes members who have made significant contributions to the advancement of operations research and the management sciences, including service to the professional field and to INFORMS. A nominee...

Editor in chief, interfaces; Deadline for nominations: May 3.(Call for Nominations)(Institute for Operations Reasearch and the Management Sciences)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... The second term of office of Terry P. Harrison as editor in chief of Interfaces expires on Dec. 31. Based on recommendations from the INFORMS Publications Committee, the president of INFORMS appointed a committee to conduct a full search for a...

Editor in chief, information systems research; Deadline for nominations: May 3.(Call for Nominations)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... The term of office of Chris F. Kemerer as editor in chief of Information Systems Research expires on Dec. 31. Based on recommendations from the INFORMS Publications Committee, the president of INFORMS appointed a committee to conduct a full...

Richard Larson.(People)(Harold Larnder Prize)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Richard Larson, president-elect of INFORMS and professor of engineering systems and civil environmental engineering at MIT, was named the 2004 recipient of the Harold Larnder Prize. The prize is awarded annually by the Canadian Operational...

Jeff Linderoth of Lehigh University and Stephen Wright of the University of Wisconsin-Madison have won Computational Optimization and Applications' 2003 Best Paper Award for the paper.(People)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2004... Jeff Linderoth of Lehigh University and Stephen Wright of the University of Wisconsin-Madison have won Computational Optimization and Applications' 2003 Best Paper Award for the paper, "Decomposition Algorithms for Stochastic Programming on a...

C. West Churchman.(In Memoriam)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
April 1, 2004... C. West Churchman, a founding father of The Institute of Management Sciences who served as president of TIMS in 1962, died March 28 at a rest home in Bolinas, Calif. He was 90. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Professor Churchman, an influential...

Gustave J. Rath.(In Memoriam)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
April 1, 2004... Dr. Gustave "Gus" J. Rath, a longtime member of INFORMS and a professor at Northwestern University from 1963 to 1996, died March 20 at his home in Huntington Beach, Calif. He was 74. Dr. Rath, who specialized in ergonomics and industrial...

Topics in Operations Research.(Informs News)
April 1, 2004... Topics in Operations Research is the INFORMS series of books and research monographs for operations research professionals. It aims to publish high-quality manuscripts that will be of value to the INFORMS community. Topics had its origin in the...

Meetings.(Informs News)(Calendar)
April 1, 2004... INFORMS Meetings 2004 April 25-27 INFORMS Conference on OR/MS Practice Applying Science to the Art of Business Hyatt Regency Cambridge, Mass. Chair: Grace Lin, IBM Business Consulting Services ...

Franz Edelman multimedia library: 2003 new releases.
April 1, 2004... DVD 23.01 MENLO WORLDWIDE FORWARDING BANK HAPOALIM CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY DVD 23.02 TEXAS CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL HEWLETT-PACKARD UPS DVD Prices: $59.95 each, or both for $99.95 Go to www.informs.org/Edelman...

Should analytics or rules drive e-sales?(LastWord)(business rules)
April 1, 2004... Businesses devote tremendous effort to managing rules. Whether the rules dictate payment terms under a contract or compliance with government regulations, rules are an important part of running a business. Software for managing rules has...