Resources Overview

When planning and scheduling demands, the system needs an accurate representation of the availability and capacity of your personnel, machines, and other scheduled equipment. You "model" these things in the system using resources. Only APS and the Scheduler constrain their activities using resources. MRP does not use resource availability to constrain its plan. Infinite APS mode considers the on-shift availability of resources but views them as having infinite capacity.

The following components comprise the system resource model:

Resources
Resource Groups
Scheduling Shifts
Shift Exceptions
Holidays

Note: Work Centers capture all costing information from the scheduling activities but do not otherwise directly affect the schedule.

Assigning Resources to Groups

An operation specifies one or more resource groups. A resource group is a list of similar resources, such as crew, machines, or fixtures, that can perform the operation. The system selects one or more resources from the group, depending on each resource's availability and on rules you define, to perform the operation.

You can define a resource as a member of more than one resource group. Also, all the members in a resource group need not be from the same resource type.

The operations that require the skills of the resources must reference the appropriate resource groups. When scheduling a job, the system assigns a member resource to perform the operation. To be used, therefore, a resource must be a member of the resource group the operation requests. Each resource should be a member of at least one resource group.

Assigning Resources to Shifts

Resources are available to perform operations only when they are on-shift (that is, when they are associated with a shift and available to work).

The Shifts tab on the Resources form lists all defined shifts on which this resource is available for working. Set up shifts on the Scheduling Shifts form.

Use the Shift Exceptions tab on the Resources form to define shift exceptions for this resource (to represent overtime or down time). To delete an out-of-date shift exception from a range of resources and dates, use the Delete Shift Exception utility. To define shift exceptions for all resources in a range of resource groups, use the Shift Exceptions by Group utility.

Note: Each shift exception is a separate combination of shift, resource, interval, and Working flag. The shift exception ID must be unique across all resources at a given site.

Work Shifts and Holidays

To identify the times a resource is available for work, you assign one or more shifts to each resource. To represent down-time or overtime, you can define shift exceptions for a specific resource on a specific shift. You can use holidays to define exceptions in which all resources on all shifts are unavailable.

If an operation requires multiple resources that are on different shifts, the operation can only be in process when all its required resources are in an up interval. For example, suppose the operation requires three resources:

Resource A: on-shift from 08:00 - 16:00
Resource B: on-shift from 10:00 - 18:00
Resource C: on-shift from 12:00 - 20:00

In this example, the operation could only be in process between 12:00 and 16:00.

Work Interruptions

If an operation is interrupted because the resource goes off-shift, the system can allocate a different resource from the same resource group to take the place of the originally allocated resource.

About Resource Capacity

With APS and the Scheduler, resources have limited capacity because they may be scheduled only for one operation at a time.

In certain situations and with certain options selected, some or all of your resources can be assumed to have infinite capacity (that is, they can work on an unlimited number of operations at the same time).

Differences from the PROGRESS Version

The table below summarizes the differences in the resource model from the same types of components in previous versions of CloudSuite Industrial.

Function	(SQL)	(PROGRESS)
Downtime & overtime	Apply to a specific resource. See Defining Shift Exceptions for more information.	Apply to the work center.
Multiple resources	Resource groups describe skill sets/functions. Can assign up to six groups to an operation. Can define alternate resources.	Can only model tooling and fixtures as materials.
Multi-skilled resources	Multi-skilled/functional resources can belong to many resource groups. For example, Maria might belong to 3 groups: the Expert Lathe, General Lathe, and General Drilling resource groups.	Cannot model.
Resource allocation	User determines when to free resource. Can substitute resources after interruption. Can assign multiple resources. Can define flexible rules.	Must allocate and free at operation. Can assign multiple tools and crew, but not machines. FIFO rule only.
Splitting loads within operation	Can split loads within operations for all resources. Can specify split size.	Can split only with crew members, but cannot specify split size.
Setup	Fixed value or variable depending on context.	Fixed value only.