Customizing GoldSim Element Icons

Posted by Ryan Roper

One of the strengths of GoldSim is that it offers several types of generic elements from which models can be constructed to represent almost any type of physical system. Because of the flexibility in how individual element types can be used as building blocks for complex systems, their default names and icons are generic. Element labels can be changed and element descriptions can be added to better indicate what an element represents. Another way to further customize an element to indicate what it represents is by changing the default element icon to a custom icon.

As an example, the default icon for a Container element is a simple box. But what if that Container represents the operations of a pump or the inventory in a warehouse? You may want to change the icon to a custom one that represents this function or purpose. In this post, we'll show you how to do this and we'll point you to an icon library on our website that already has a number of icons you might like to use.

GoldSim Applications at the Mine Water Solutions Conference

Posted by Rick Kossik

I've just returned from the Mine Water Solutions in Extreme Environments Conference in Vancouver, BC.  This biennial conference focuses on a wide range of issues associated with mine water management, particularly in extremely wet, dry and cold climates, and with extreme hydrogeological and geochemical issues.  As many of you know, GoldSim is used extensively worldwide for such applications, and as a result, GoldSim was commonly mentioned during the conference.  For example, in one of the keynote sessions, Lisa Wade of GoldCorp (one of the world's largest gold producers), described the company's Water Stewardship Strategy, which it uses to ensure water security and production, reduce costs and impacts, improve operations, and address stakeholder concerns.  During the talk, Lisa mentioned that as part of the Strategy, water management models at the various mine sites are all carried out using GoldSim.  In addition, during the conference a number of technical papers featuring GoldSim were presented. Two such applications are briefly summarized in this post.

American Water Resources Association 2015 Conference

Posted by Jason Lillywhite

I recently traveled to sunny Los Angeles, California for the AWRA 2015 Specialty Conference: "Water for Urban Areas: Managing Risks and Building Resiliency." All of the presentations I listened to were very interesting, some of which used GoldSim as the tool to facilitate the studies and results presented. The highlight of the trip, of course, was to visit with some of our customers and make new friends. I also learned more about some of the unique challenges California is facing due to continued population growth, climate change, water quality conditions, and aging infrastructures.

Mark Your Calendar for the GoldSim User Conference in September 2015!

Posted by Rick Kossik

We recently published this in our newsletter, but I thought it would be worthwhile to post here also. After a long hiatus, we plan to host a GoldSim User Conference in Seattle in September 2015.  The conference is just in the planning stages now, but the dates are very likely to be September 24 and 25.  The conference will be preceded (on September 22 and 23) by a two day training workshop (focusing on novice users).

GoldSim Applications at (Radioactive) Waste Management Conference

Posted by Rick Kossik

I've just returned from the Waste Management (WM) Conference in Phoenix, which we attend annually.  This conference attracts thousands of registrants from around the world and is widely regarded as the premier international conference for the management of radioactive material and related topics. As many of you know, although GoldSim is currently used in a wide variety of applications, it was originally developed to support radioactive waste management applications (if you are curious, I discussed this early history in a previous blog post). GoldSim continues to be used extensively worldwide for such applications, and typically during the conference a number of technical papers featuring GoldSim are presented. It is always rewarding and exciting to sit in a technical session at a conference and see how GoldSim has been applied to address an interesting and important problem.  A few such applications discussed at the conference are briefly summarized in this post.

Exploratory Modeling and GoldSim

Posted by Nick Martin

There is an interesting recent journal article, “Exploratory Modeling: Extracting Causality From Complexity” (Larsen et al. 2014), which describes the usefulness and success of exploratory modeling in the earth sciences. Although this article does not mention GoldSim, it provides a nice explanation of modeling philosophies which work well in GoldSim. These philosophies emphasize a “top-down” approach to modeling complex systems and focus on the representation of uncertainty in addressing “big-picture” issues.

Generic Mine Water Balance Model

Posted by Nick Martin

We frequently get requests for an example Mine Water Balance model with dashboards that can be used in sales presentations and as a technical demonstration tool. Recently, a GoldSim Mine Water Balance Model has been posted to the Model Library which fulfills these requirements.

Simulating a One-Armed Bandit

Posted by Jason Lillywhite

If you ever run into GoldSim employees in Las Vegas, you will never see them sitting in front of a slot machine. Dealing with probabilities on a daily basis gives us a feel for our odds when dealing with uncertainty. But what if we built a model that only simulates the one-armed bandit? This is the question I asked myself the other day when Rick mentioned the dice-rolling model. What I thought would end up to be a mere exercise in probabilities ended up in a little game that is almost as addicting as solitaire!

Using Period-Based Results in Model Calculations

Posted by Ryan Roper

We've had a number of support inquiries where users need some way of calculating period-based summary data (such as monthly or annual averages or cumulative amounts) for use in other calculations within the same model (e.g. post-processing). GoldSim's reporting periods feature is great for generating this sort of summary data with little effort on the part of the user, but these results are only intended to be viewed and not used for other subsequent calculations. If you do need to use these results for other calculations in the same model, our model library contains a number of examples that illustrate how to calculate such results manually. This blog post briefly describes some of these examples and points you to where you can find them in our library to see them in more detail.

How Big Will Melbourne Australia be in 2035?

Posted by Jason Lillywhite

Many of you may be familiar with GoldSim models that incorporate simple population growth (e.g., in order to compute water demands in the future), but may not have seen complex demographic models that fully incorporate all the details required to accurately simulate the population growth for a large urban area. One of our recently showcased models on our website does just that. It probabilistically simulates the population of the City of Melbourne, Australia for the next 20 years. I found this model to be a highly effective population simulator, and believe the approach could potentially be applied to population forecasts for a variety of models.

On the Road Again...

Posted by Rick Kossik

As we do every year, we will be attending a number of conferences this year, where we will have a booth, and in some cases be presenting papers.  If you are attending one of these conferences, we'd love to see you.  Stop by our booth, where you can meet GoldSim technical staff to ask questions, suggest new features, or just chat. The preliminary list of conferences we plan on attending are listed below:

GoldSim and Microsoft SQL Server

Posted by Nick Martin

Occasionally GoldSim users are interested in connecting model elements to databases to pull data directly into their models from a database. Recently, there has been increased interest in connecting model elements to Microsoft SQL Server databases.

Performance, Risk Assessment and Miss Atomic Bomb 1957

Posted by Rick Kossik

I recently attended the Performance and Risk Assessment Community of Practice (P&RA CoP) Annual Technical Exchange Meeting in Las Vegas. This group is part of the effort by the US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Environmental Management to support risk-informed environmental cleanup and waste management decisions within the DOE complex.  GoldSim has been used throughout the DOE complex for many years, and it was nice to see a number of excellent GoldSim applications discussed during the meeting. As a side note, the meeting was held at a very interesting location - the National Atomic Testing Museum - which is definitely worth a visit the next time you are in Las Vegas and need a break from the Strip!

Customizing Dashboards

Posted by Ryan Roper

GoldSim dashboards offer a way of putting an ‘interface’ on your GoldSim model that allows you or a colleague or client to change inputs or settings and to view model results. Creating good dashboards may have as much to do with making them nice-looking and easy to use as it has to do with mere functionality (i.e. providing access to appropriate inputs and results). The focus of this post is mainly about appearance and usability of dashboards. I’ll offer some ideas based on experiences I had while working on a project with a group at Sandia National Laboratories.

Probability Distributions in GoldSim

Posted by Nick Martin

GoldSim uses probability distributions for model inputs and to present results. Different types of probability distributions can be used for inputs and results. Occasionally, GoldSim users have questions about the various types of probability distributions in GoldSim and about how distributions are calculated in GoldSim. In particular, questions often come up about how GoldSim calculates probability distributions for Monte Carlo simulation results. An algorithm is built into GoldSim which determines whether to represent, and calculate, a Monte Carlo simulation result with a discrete or continuous distribution. A Knowledge Base article was recently created which provides details of this algorithm and provides additional information about the categories of distributions used in GoldSim.

A History Lesson

Posted by Rick Kossik

For the inaugural post to the GoldSim Blog, I thought it would be fun to go back in time and provide a history lesson.  Where did GoldSim come from? Why was it developed? Who got the ball rolling? Who were the first users? For those of you interested in such ancient history, this post will describe the early history of GoldSim from its origins in the late 1980s to the formation of the GoldSim Technology Group (GTG) in 2004. 

Welcome to the GoldSim Blog!

Posted by Rick Kossik

This blog is provided as a resource to existing users of the GoldSim probabilistic simulation framework.  However, you don't need to be a GoldSim expert to follow this blog; it should also prove to be a valuable resource for novice GoldSim users.  (If you are completely new to GoldSim, this is not the place the start; instead, you should visit the GoldSim website).

This blog complements the resources available in the GoldSim Library (such as the Model Library and Knowledge Base) and User Forum, and may occasionally refer to articles or models referenced there.  It is intended to provide an informal mechanism for GoldSim staff to share their knowledge, point out some of the more advanced (and perhaps overlooked) GoldSim features, share and discuss common mistakes we see in GoldSim applications, discuss interesting applications, and keep you abreast of our plans for further GoldSim developments.  

If there are specific topics you would like to see discussed, let us know!