The Tour2: reloaded!

After the first Tour model posted on december, now we are presenting its second version!

In this new release, as it was promissed in the first one, the user can play and interact with the model, testing different strategies, either individual strategies (attacking at some particular possition at each stage, going for the mountain points or competing for the final sprint) or group strategies (accelerating at a point of the race, defending the leader or responding to another's attack).

To complement this, we now have a complete punctuation system, by which there are intermediate sprint points, mountain points and the already known final points in each stage. With all these, cyclists can already compete for the yellow, green and polka-dot jerseys!

Still not satisfied? Now you can decide how to create your cyclists' profiles! You can modify your cyclists' energy abailable, as well as how it will be distributed in six different capacities (resistance, climbing, hills, sprint, attack and descent), either for your team as a whole or for each cyclist. It will be much easier to "create" your own Alberto, Andy or even Cadel!

Finally, the energy abailable for each stage is renewed as a function of the final position in the previous stage, the position in the time race and the difference made in this last race.

Having said all, now is time you get to play!

Here is the link to run the model:

http://www.runthemodel.com/models/528/

hope you enjoy it!

Make your Path

PLAY & OPTIMIZE

In mathematics, a graph is an abstract representation of a set of objects where some pairs of the objects are connected by links. The interconnected objects are represented by mathematical abstractions called nodes, and the links that connect some pairs of nodes are called edges. This is what we also know as a "network".

There are 2 challenges within networks that caught our attention: 

Click on the image to start the model

Being able to draw it. Yes, anyone can draw some circles and lines, but the challenge is drawing them in a way that can be understood. In this model we use an adapted Kamada-Kawai algorithm that represents the graph with a physical model in order to organize and redistribute nodes. Each edge works like a spring and each node works as a charged particle. Newton's Law takes care of the rest. The user (YOU) will be able to interact with the model in order to obtain the desired layout for the graph.

Find the optimal path within any 2 nodes. In this model we use an adapted Dijkstra algorithm to obtain the best path. The user will interact with the model by trying to find the optimal path in a click-by-click approach. We are so proud of the algorithm that we defy you to find a better route. 

That's all! Just click the image to try the model and hope you enjoy!

The JAMs are back!

On last Friday, we started our JAM season for 2012. That is a series of workshops and speeches I organize on certain Friday mornings in order to train our crew in some topics. Or to simply keep our curiosity popping up!

As many C7´s work at the System Dynamics Department (at Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires), we thought it would be a great idea to start this 2012 with a JAM on that subject for the team. System Dynamics is an approach to understanding the behaviour of complex systems and much of its terms our part of our jargon.

Our first 2012 JAM!

Gastón was in charge of this JAM, and he came up with a beautiful presentation for the workshop, telling us how System Dynamics can help us see the world in a different way.

A nice kick-off for the JAM year... We´ll keep on jamming!

ps: here´s one of the videos we saw at the beggining of the JAM. We like it as it is a funny example of how everything is connected!