Appearance
Running the warehouse
Why it matters
This is where the profiles meet the drawing. You set up a run once; it takes seconds; and it tells you things the estimate cannot: queues, peaks, stockouts and late trucks.
In Warehouse Studio
On the Simulate page, click Runs, then New run.
Ready to run?
The right-hand card checks the scenario before anything runs. Each item is either:
- blocks the run: a problem the simulation cannot work around. Fix it first.
- advisory: something the run will assume, and say it assumed.
Each item links to the place that fixes it, for example Fix on resources.
Common items, in plain words:
| Item | Plain words | Kind |
|---|---|---|
| No calendar shifts | Nobody ever works. | Blocks |
| No inbound trucks and no order types | Nothing arrives, nothing is ordered. | Blocks |
| No inbound docks | There is no door to unload at. | Blocks |
| No staging | There is nowhere to put unloaded pallets. | Blocks |
| No storage | There are no rack bays to put pallets into. | Blocks |
| Storage full at start | The racks start so full nothing fits. | Blocks |
| No product groups | Orders cannot be sized. | Blocks |
| No labour for a process | Nobody on any shift does, say, unloading. | Blocks |
| Staging capacity assumed | The floor's pallet capacity is estimated from its area: 60 % of the floor at 1.2 m² a pallet. | Advisory |
| No pick face | Cases and eaches come from reserve; replenishment is not modelled. | Advisory |
| No pack pool / no load pool | Packing or loading takes no time. | Advisory |
| Not routed | The drawing has no aisles, so distances are straight lines. | Advisory |
| Profiles assumed | Some inputs are marked assumed; the results inherit that. | Advisory |
The settings
Run
| Field | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Name | Blank gives a dated name. |
| Horizon | How many days to simulate, up to 56. |
| Warm-up | Days run but not measured, so the warehouse is not judged while it fills up from empty. |
| Replications | How many times to play the week, up to 50. More gives narrower bands. |
| Start date | Blank means next week's start. |
| Seed | Random, or a Fixed seed to replay the same rolls. Use a fixed seed whenever you plan to compare. |
Inbound & staging
| Field | Choices |
|---|---|
| When staging is full | Wait: a truck holds its door until there is room. Overflow: pallets are placed anyway and the overrun is counted. |
| Crew per truck | People unloading one truck at once. |
| Storage filled at start | The share of rack positions already taken. |
| Holidays | Whether trucks still arrive on holidays. |
Stock
| Field | Choices |
|---|---|
| When a pick face is short | Wait for the stock to land. Fail: pick short and count it. Back-order: the short line steps aside and the rest of the order goes on. |
| Pick faces start | Full or Empty. |
| Received pallets | Optionally put away straight to the pick face when it has room. |
Dispatch
| Field | Choices |
|---|---|
| A free crew takes | First come: the oldest waiting pick. By departure: the pick whose truck leaves first. |
Run it
Click the big button, which reads like Run 7 days × 3 replications. A 7-day run of the demo takes about 15 seconds. The page follows the run's progress, and you can stop it.
A run's status is one of: Queued, Running, Stopping, Done, Failed, Stopped, Interrupted.
Stale runs
A run remembers exactly what it read: every profile, and the drawing's counts. If you change the scenario afterwards, the run is marked stale. Its results are still true for the inputs it used, and its Inputs panel shows them.
Try it
In the demo, open New run and read the readiness card. Which advisories does it list, and what does each one mean for the results? Then run 7 days × 3 replications with seed 42.
Words you just learned
Readiness · blocks / advisory · horizon · warm-up · replications · seed · stale.