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:
NOTE: Work Centers capture all costing information from the scheduling activities but do not otherwise directly affect the schedule.
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.
The member resources may be working different shifts, have different current setups, or have different processing times. 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.
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:
In this example, the operation could only be in process between 12:00 and 16:00.
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. See Handling Resource Reallocation During Interruptions for more information.
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). See About Infinite Resource Capacity for a list of situations in which a resource has infinite capacity.
The table below summarizes the differences in the resource model from the same types of components in previous versions of SyteLine.
| Function | SyteLine (SQL) | SyteLine (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. |
Handling Resource Reallocation During Interruptions
Using the Resource Gantt Chart – Windows Client
Using the Resource Gantt Chart – Web Client
Resource Sequencing Sort Setup