How to create a 'Rule Package'
Contents
Disclaimer
Below is an extremely simplified model of automotive industry. Please don't use it for serious purposes other than the one I'm going to explain ;-)
Philosophy
To benchmark rules engines performance and integratability in ADempiere, a real rule package is needed. However since rule extraction from real systems is not a trivial task, a simplified model of the real world is presented here to be considered as the world of business from which the rules should be extracted. The model is represented here as plain text, since some of us may not have access to modeling tools.
The model
Entities and their attributes. Each attribute has an abbreviation which may be used when writing rules, eg. instead of SteeFactory profit one may write just SPF.
Model's entities
| RawMaterial | ||
|---|---|---|
| Attribute | Abbrev. | Description |
| 1. name | RN | Material name: for this purpose only 'Oil' and 'Iron stone'. |
| 2. price | RP | Price per ton or drum. |
| 3. production | RA | Production amount per month in tons or drums. |
| SteelFactory | ||
|---|---|---|
| Attribute | Abbrev. | Description |
| 1. name | SN | Steel factory name. |
| 2. rawInput | SRI | Iron stone input per month in tons. |
| 3. rawDemand | SRD | Iron stone demand per month in tons. |
| 4. prodcution | SPR | Net production per month in tons. |
| 5. quality | SQU | Production quality, between 0 and 100. The less the quality, the less the price will be. |
| 6. price | SPC | Price per ton. |
| 7. profit | SPF | Profit per month. |
| 8. customerDemand | SCD | Customers' demand for steel. Stricly means how many tons of steel sold out per month. |
| AutomotiveFactory | ||
|---|---|---|
| Attribute | Abbrev. | Description |
| 1. name | AN | Automotive factory name. |
| 2. rawInput | ARI | Steel input per month in tons. |
| 3. rawDemand | ARD | Steel demand per month in tons. |
| 4. prodcution | APR | Net production per month in number of automobiles produced. |
| 5. quality | AQU | Production quality, between 0 and 100. |
| 6. price | APC | Price per automobile. |
| 7. profit | APF | Profit per month. |
| 8. customerDemand | ACD | Customers' demand for automobile. Stricly means the number of automobiles sold out per month. |
Model's Effected and Effectors
An X in (R, C) shows that the row R is directly effected by column C.
| RN | RP | RA | SN | SRI | SRD | SPR | SPC | SPF | SCD | AN | ARI | ARD | APR | APC | APF | ACD | |
| RN | |||||||||||||||||
| RP | |||||||||||||||||
| RA | |||||||||||||||||
| SN | |||||||||||||||||
| SRI | X1 | X | |||||||||||||||
| SRD | X | ||||||||||||||||
| SPR | X | ||||||||||||||||
| SPC | X1 | X | X | ||||||||||||||
| SPF | X | X | |||||||||||||||
| SCD | X | ||||||||||||||||
| AN | |||||||||||||||||
| ARI | X | X | |||||||||||||||
| ARD | X | X | |||||||||||||||
| APR | X | ||||||||||||||||
| APC | X | X | |||||||||||||||
| APF | X | X | |||||||||||||||
| ACD | X2 | X2 | X |
1: If the material name is 'Iron stone'.
2: If the material name is 'Oil'.
Model's relations described
- (SRI <= SRD) always should be true.
- (SPR <= SCD) always should be true.
- (SPR <= nSRI) for (n) a pre-defined constant, should be true.
- (ARI <= ARD) always should be true.
- (APR <= ACD) always should be true.
- (SCD = ARI) always should be true.
How profit is calculated:
- SPF = SPC*SCD - RP*SRI
- APF = APC*ACD - SPR*SPC
Implementation
After the rule package reaches a reasonable size, implementation will start, probably with multiple engines such as JBossRules[1], Mandarax [2] or eclipse-clp[3]. Then we may judge the performance and ease of use.
For more info, see the related forum on SourceForge [4].
How to add rules?
Should you have extracted a rule, just edit the page and add the rule to the bottom of the page (Don't forget to put your signature at the end of the edited text!). We will discuss it and add it to the package if it is appropriate for the purpose.
Rules should be expressed in plain simple English so that they are understandable by anybody who reads them.
Download the rule package
The latest version of the rule package is always downloadable here: [5]
Any comments or ideas?
Please study the model and inform (me) through 'discussion' tab, in case you have got a better idea or model.
Rules here!
Your rules go here:
