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The more complex your simulation gets the harder it becomes to verify your simulation is doing what you told it to do! See below for the many features SIMUL8 has that are designed to help you.

Step

The Step button lets you to move through the simulation one event at a time. This is really useful when trying to debug a simulation. It allows you to closely follow one work item and check the parameters being updated at each stage.

Simulation Monitor

The simulation monitor lets you see the detailed activity taking place within SIMUL8's internal simulation engine.

The Next Step tab shows a description of the next thing which is going to happen or the next thing which SIMUL8 will test to see if it can happen. (For example "End of job on work center" or "Try to move a work item to a work center"). The History tab shows a list of the previous 100 "Steps" and when each step took place.

Through the Simulation Monitor options you can tell SIMUL8 to stop at an exact time or when a specified event occurs.

See CLOCK MENU > MONITOR SIMULATION.

Watch Window

This amazing debugging aid shows you the state of any part of your simulation at any time. Any formula or property reference can be added to the window. Its value is updated as it changes. The watch window is dockable so you can leave it visible as your simulation runs

This feature is only available in versions higher than SIMUL8 R9. See TOOLS MENU > WATCH WINDOW.

View Contents

The contents dialog of a work center or storage bin lets you look inside at the actual work items currently inside the object. The displayed dialog box lists the work items and their labels. Clicking on a work item and a label name displays the values of the label. Right click in the Contents Dialog to copy the contents information to the clipboard. This allows precise analysis of the contents of an object.

See WORK CENTER PROPERTIES > CONTENTS or STORAGE BIN PROPERTIES > CONTENTS.

View All Work Items

The View All Work Items options allows you to view the properties and location of every work item in the simulation.

To use as a debug tool, select any work item on the screen by clicking on it while holding down CTRL and SHIFT. This will take you straight to the contents dialog for that work item. Select the THIS WI IMAGE option and change the color of the item. You can then watch the work item travel through the simulation.

This feature is only available in versions higher than SIMUL8 R9. See OBJECTS MENU > ADVANCED > ALL WORK ITEMS.

Disable Current Line

Disable Current Line “Comments Out” a line of Visual Logic, so that you can test if it has the desired effect when running. For example, in this block of code the second line of code (with the large red X at the beginning of the line) is disabled and will not run.

Debug at Current Line

Stop (Debug) at Current Line is a very powerful debugging feature. The debug feature will color a line of Visual Logic, indicating that this is a breakpoint.

When SIMUL8 encounters this line of code it will stop, and display a message. Pressing the Step button or F8 function key allows the code to progress, line by line. The code can be “watched” as it executes to make sure that it is executing as designed.

Speed Analyzer

Find out the parts of your Visual Logic that are taking a long time to run. This feature makes it quick to find ways to improve the speed of very complex simulations.

This feature is only available in SIMUL8 Professional. See TOOLS MENU > VISUAL LOGIC EVENTS > SERVICES > SPEED ANALYSIS.

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