Waiting Lines

Introduction:Waiting Lines
 One or more customers waiting for service
 Can be people or objects

 Forms because of temporary imbalance

between demand and capacity
 Variable demand rate

 Waiting lines can develop

even if the time to process a

customer is constant
 Characteristics
 Customer population
 Population size, behavior, statistical distribution

 Poisson Distribution
e -λ λ x
P (x ) = for x = 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, …
x!
where P(x) =probability of x arrivals
x = number of arrivals per unit of time
λ = average arrival rate
e = 2.7183 (which is the base of the natural logarithms)
 Poisson Distribution
e-λ λ x
Probability = P(x) =
x!

0.25 – 0.25 –

0.02 – 0.02 –
Probability

Probability
0.15 – 0.15 –

0.10 – 0.10 –

0.05 – 0.05 –

– –

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 x 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 x
Distribution for λ = 2 Distribution for λ = 4
Figure D.2
Characteristics
Waiting line of customers
 Limited or unlimited in length, discipline
of people or items in it
Service system
 Described by number of lines and the
arrangement of facilities
Single channel, single phase system

Single channel, multiple phase system

Multiple channel, single phase system

Multiple channel, multiple phase

system
Queuing Models
 Single server model
1. Arrivals are served on a FIFO basis and every arrival
waits to be served regardless of the length of the
queue
2. Arrivals are independent of preceding arrivals but the
average number of arrivals does not change over time
3. Arrivals are described by a Poisson probability
distribution and come from an infinite population
Single Server Model
4. Service times vary from one customer to the
next and are independent of one another, but
their average rate is known
5. The service rate is faster than the arrival rate
Queuing Models

 Multiple server model

 Finite source model

 Constant service time model