Simul8 feature highlights
We add game-changing enhancements with every Simul8 release, all driven by feedback from our user community. If you're using an older version of Simul8, upgrade your software to take advantage of these great features and other improvements.
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"At Simul8 our feature releases are based on user feedback. From making scripting faster through the new Visual Logic editor modes; to multi-task timing, Process Mining and sharing your simulations online through Share - we listen and we develop for you, our users!"
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Simul8 2023 features
Experiment Builder - experiment with any part of your process, without code!
Simul8 has always been the fastest tool to learn, fastest tool to build and with this major update, we’re taking it to the next level.
Introducing Experiment Builder. Whether it’s simple what-if scenarios or bold process changes you are testing, our new Experiment Builder allows you to dynamically change parameter values and structural aspects of your simulations, meaning it’s easier than ever to quickly experiment with any part of your process – without the need for code!
This is only the first phase of our ground-breaking Experiment Builder release, watch this space for lots of new features coming soon.
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Elevate your simulations with improved connectivity and customization
Simul8 has moved to 64-bit!
With our 64-bit release, your simulations just got bigger and better. Simul8 can now talk to 64-bit enabled databases using our SQL functionality and 64-bit versions of apps such as Python – meaning improved connectivity for our users.
Internal Spreadsheets have had a makeover
Our unique, powerful internal spreadsheet feature has had a makeover. Featuring a modern look, you can now create compelling interfaces to level-up your simulations! That's not all. Now with conditional formatting rules, formulas, and much more, it is easier than ever to personalize your data.
Simul8 2022 features
Transaction Log - Track every movement in your simulation
Simul8 already gives you access to results information in your simulation. Now, with our improved Transaction Log feature, you can further track every movement in your simulation, in just a few clicks!
Validate changes and identify patterns in your results through a single detailed log showing the movement of all Work Items, in and out of every Simulation Object. We have streamlined how the files work, so you have only one location to manage for Simulation Objects and Resources respectively, added more options for customization of information and made data produced by logs more accessible.
That's not all, once you have used the feature to create logs for your work items, you have a great source for further analysis. Slice and dice the data using an external tool like Excel or PowerBI to calculate, summarize and analyze data as well as see comparisons, patterns, and trends in your data.
The flexibility and depth of data available in the Transaction Log make it an ideal data source to level up your results even further and use it as a source for PowerBI and Python dashboards.
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OptQuest for Simul8 - go from "what if" to "what’s best"
Optimization is a powerful addition to simulation. Simulation is all about saying what if, and experimenting. As you experiment you gradually work out the best way to configure your process for optimal performance.
But what if you could skip that lengthy process of experimentation? What if rather than getting a range of results you have to decipher, your simulation could tell you exactly the right combination to maximize performance?
With OptQuest you can. OptQuest lets you move from what if to what’s best. It lets you test thousands of different parameter combinations to find the best answer.
Machine learning – automatically build your simulation rules from your data
Simul8 is already the fastest tool on the market, with the addition of machine learning we’ve just taken this to a whole new level! No more having to interrogate process owners and data sets to find the unique routing or timing rules, train your Machine Learning algorithm and let Simul8 do the rest!
We are the only simulation tool on the market to offer integrated machine learning functionality. Everyone lets you train data sets, or optimize end results. We let you use machine learning directly inside your simulation. Just call out to your preferred R or Python machine learning library to process your data set, and it’ll tell Simul8 what it should do next.
Combine ML with our other killer USP Process Mining, and you have the ability to build continuously up to date, real time digital twins.
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Routing using Machine Learning
Creating Distributions Using Machine Learning
Use Python and R to control your simulation
Already know Python and R, and would prefer to write your custom rules in those languages? With this release you now can.
You’ve always had the ability to control Simul8 via APIs in Python and R, so you can embed Simul8 in your tech stack. This release now lets you link a R and Python script to a custom distribution so you can read out to your R or Python script to let it do the processing for you. This lets you access machine learning libraries descibed above, but also to write your own custom code for Simul8 to obey.
Visual Logic Developer Mode
Using Simul8's own scripting language built especially for simulation logic building, this release futher extends the power and flexibility of this unique feature.
Developer mode allows you to write Visual Logic code quickly without the need of having to validate each line as you go. Any errors or code suggestions are listed in an Error box located at the bottom of the Visual Logic Editor. This allows for quick and efficient code writing and helps point you towards any errors that may be in your Visual Logic commands.
We've also made changes to Logic Writer mode, previously called "Free Edit" to make it even easier and faster to write and validate code. And the Logic Builder mode allows you to build up Visual Logic commands without the need to code, using our Visual Logic Editor wizard. Just double click on a command to begin!
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Simul8 2021 features
Process Mining
For the first time, we’re combining the unique strengths of process mining with the limitless experimentation of simulation.
By importing event logs from business information systems, Simul8 applies algorithms to the data to create an instant simulation. Routing arrows, activity timings, arrival schedules and resources are all automatically generated in a matter of seconds.
From operational changes to large-scale transformation, it’s never been faster to start experimenting and testing what-if scenarios to take process performance to radical new levels.
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Share
To help drive decision-making across your business, we’ve integrated the ability to share simulations into Simul8 for desktop and the web – giving you the ability to seamlessly build, run and share all on one platform for the first time.
Share is included with every Simul8 subscription so you can invite your team to experiment with simulations and get fast, accurate results to drive agile decisions. Best of all, shared simulations can be opened in a browser, allowing anyone to easily run and experiment - no downloads or installation needed!
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Simul8 2020 features
Database Connections
With the rise of digital twins, many of our users not only want to populate their simulations with larger data sets, but to be able to do this in real-time. That’s why we’ve introduced a new and improved SQL connection setup wizard and syntax builder in Simul8 2020 to help you build multiple database connections and queries, without the need to use Visual Logic.
You can use this powerful feature to pull in data generated from sources such as ERP systems or production schedules to continually feed your simulations with data. You can also use the syntax builder to quickly populate a query of data sets to import. For example, you might want to only pull in orders expected on a certain date.
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Google Sheets Connections
With the growing adoption of cloud-based productivity tools, we’ve introduced a new Google Sheets integration in Simul8 2020. With this industry first feature, you’ll be able to seamlessly connect your simulations to input data stored in the cloud – as well as outputting results back to spreadsheets.
So, why is this such a game-changer? The ability to easily collaborate with colleagues to edit data in the cloud allows for faster collaboration when you want to test different inputs or scenarios. Anyone you have shared a Google Sheet with can update figures in real-time and these can be pulled through to your simulation with the click of a button.
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Onscreen Button Data imports
We’ve now added more functionality to Simul8’s onscreen buttons. With Simul8 2020, you can import data via Excel Connections, databases and Google Sheets Connections just by clicking on an interactive button next to your simulation.
If you’re regularly changing data sets, this feature will help simplify and speed up how data can be updated within your simulation. It will also help makes the creation of user interfaces for your simulations faster, enabling stakeholders to easily try changing data sets for themselves.
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Distribution Viewer
Many Simul8 users use Named Distributions to define timings like inter-arrival times, activity timings or repair times in their simulations. The new Distribution Viewer feature makes it even easier to define a distribution.
Not only will this new feature help you with the validation of your simulations, but it will also improve the visibility of how data is being applied in the simulation for stakeholders. At a glance, you or your stakeholders will be able to see how the distribution looks and how timings will vary.
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Simul8 2019 features
Simul8 Online
Build, run and share your simulations online and installation-free! Simul8 Online is the world's first advanced online process simulation software. Using the same extensive feature set, intuitive drag and drop interface and fast results as our desktop version, Simul8 Online is included for our subscription and Annual Maintenance customers.
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R Integration
Simul8 users have the ability to export their results to many other programs and applications to help them conduct further analysis or present their results to stakeholders in different ways. Driven by feedback from our users, we are adding another option to this list with the ability to connect to R. Using this powerful feature, you can easily export your simulation results directly to R and even run R scripts within Simul8.
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Multi-task Timing
Multi-task Timing is another great new addition to Simul8 2019 based on our users’ feedback and queries about incorporating different sub-tasks into an Activity. For example, Activities in your simulation might need a preparation task before the main task and it require its own resource and/or has its own variation, i.e. distribution. For the main task itself, the distribution could be different than those other sub-tasks and you might also want to be flexible on whether to include a resource requirement. As a result, defining an Activity with several sub-tasks could sometimes be complex to set-up.
Using Multi-task Timing, it’s now quicker and easier to define an Activity with many sub-tasks that each have their own timing distributions and resource requirements.
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Pick and Place by Condition
In previous versions of Simul8, the Pick and Place feature could be used to simulate the movement of Work Items to and from a Conveyor. You could also set the length where a Work Item is either picked from or placed onto a Conveyor, instead of only having Work Items enter and leave at their start and end points. With Simul8 2019, Pick and Place by Condition gives you the added ability to pick and place Work Items by meeting certain defined conditions.
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Batch by Condition
Conveyors can now also make use of the new routing-in feature Batch by Condition which is also available for Activities. In fact, Batch by Condition is similar to Pick and Place by Condition, only without a specified Conveyor length. By using Batch by Condition the conveyor will only accept work items when a specified set of conditional statements has been met.
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Shift Dependent Conveyors
Many users will have used the Shifts functionality for Resources, Activities or even Start Points. Now with Simul8 2019, Shifts can be also assigned directly to Conveyors. This new feature greatly complements the additional control that users now have for Conveyors and reduces the number of necessary activities in conveyor intensive processes.
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Simul8 2018 features
Route Out By Condition
This powerful feature enables you to set conditions in your simulation where, if met, Work Items will be sent down that route. If your process rules require an ‘If’ statement to determine routing or even if you want to refer to a formula or multiple other label values to work out where Work Items should go, all of these options are possible without the need for Visual Logic or spreadsheets.
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Route Out By Sequence
This feature provides a new routing method to allow you to control the destination that your work items are routed to in a predefined repeating sequence.
Route Out By Sequence is a great addition because it’s an intuitive and quick way to set up your routing by sequence without using any Visual Logic or spreadsheets. You can set it up in just a few clicks and quickly compare different sequence options to find the most efficient and best sequence option for your process.
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Arrival Planner
The Arrival Planner will help you to reach solutions even faster by exploring your process behavior through a single day, to across months or even years so you can quickly identify things like the impact of seasonal variation. Typical analysis tasks like comparing a low volume week against your busiest week or testing best-case and worst-case capacity planning over a whole year is now much easier.
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Central Label Editor
As a single-window interface, the new Central Label Editor makes setting up, editing and tracking Labels so much faster. Frequent operations like creating a Label, attaching it to an Activity and setting it to control routing can all now be done in seconds.
This new feature will help you save more time on every simulation you build by instantly showing you where all of your Labels have been applied and enabling you to quickly edit them all from one central place.
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Activity Timing By Label
This powerful Simul8 feature offers an alternative to giving an Activity a universal process time for all items. Using Activity Timing By Label, the process times in your simulation can now be based on the type of item itself i.e. the Label value.
Most processes have great levels of variability with different product types, customers or patients, so Activity Timing By Label will be valuable in situations where you want to give an Activity a shorter process time for one item type and longer process time when handling a different item type.
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Quick Build
Put simply, Quick Build allows you to instantly create an entire simulation based on data inputs that you enter in a sheet. Once you have entered Activity names and their key characteristics, Simul8 will automatically add and connect all of the simulation objects in just one click!
Many of our users utilize Simul8 to verify the potential set-up of brand new greenfield sites or lots of individual processes with similar structures. Quick Build was designed with this kind of objective in mind, enabling you to rapidly build simulations of these systems to quickly assess their performance. For example, identifying whether target throughput can be hit.
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Simul8 2017 features
Increased trial speed
Improved parallel processing performance so you can run trials even faster.
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Work item tracking
A debugging tool to help determine the correct flow of work items and resources.
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Custom UI enhancements
Creating custom user interfaces for simulations is now even more intuitive.
Simul8 2016 features
Power & Free Conveyors
Capture realistic and complex process behavior in your simulation with our new conveyor types.
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Overtime
A debugging tool to help determine the correct flow of work items and resources.
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Tabs & HTML Dialogs
Create interactive dashboards for your simulations to help decision makers navigate, change parameters and analyze your simulation results.
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Simul8 2015 features
Variable Collect
Allowing you to choose how many work items need to be collected based on a Work Items Label value.
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Time Interval Results
Analyze your KPIs by custom intervals using Time Interval Results.
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Scheduled Maintenance
Define planned maintenance events on any activity using the calendar.
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MORE Plot
Allowing you to have a better understanding of the risk and error of your simulation runs to support decision making.
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Simul8 2014 features
Travel Time Matrix
See all of your objects at a glance and edit the travel times between all relevant objects using just one menu.
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Resource Schedule
Quickly vary the number of resources on shift by periods of the day and create unique shift patterns.
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Resource individuality
Ensure the same resource who has worked on a task at one stage in the process is assigned to the same work at a later stage.
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Resource Pools within Pools
Create pools of resources within pools to give you even more flexibility when allocating resources in your simulation.
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Syntax Highlighting
Improve the efficiency of debugging using our completely customizable syntax highlighting.
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New Coding Features
Updates to Multidimensional Arrays and enhanced our Visual Logic commands to improve your control over your simulation.
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Simul8 2013 features
State Charts
Make decisions based on the status of work items at any stage of a simulation run with instant data visualization.
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Excel Wizard
Import your data from Microsoft Excel® in just 3 clicks.
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AutoCAD® import
Import drawings from the latest version of AutoCAD® into your simulation.
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Enhanced Data Visualization
View routing information on hover, instantly see hotspots in your process and more.
Simul8 2012 features
BPMN Objects
Draw BPM Diagrams straight into Simul8 and use simulation to optimize your entire business process from end-to-end.
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New Lean Features
Value Stream Mapping, Value Add Time, Lead Time Cycle Charts and more.
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Improved interface
New look objects with more intuitive names and new paddle for faster modeling.
Spreadsheet and Scripting
Drag and drop sliders onto your simulation window to instantly change values and test scenarios.