3 ms·
Do you have an actual refutation though? Why does buffering perform better in real-world factories than the simulated ones in Factorio?
by rytill 5y ago
Do you have an actual refutation though? Why does buffering perform better in real-world factories than the simulated ones in Factorio?
- bhelkey 5y agoThe cost of some shortages is measured in lives. With such shortages, preventing the shortage is better than mitigating the shortage. Mitigating the shortage is in turn better than not mitigating the shortage. A buffer gives us time. That time can be used to save lives. A buffer absorbs a short term disruption in a supplier which prevents the shortage. A buffer gives time to look for another supplier in a long term disruption. A buffer delays a shortage when no other supplier is feasible.
- leetcrew 5y agothe short answer is the real world is a lot more complicated and random than factorio. factorio is pretty complex for a video game, but trivial compared to a real world supply chain. most of the game mechanics are deterministic, and latencies are measured in minutes rather than weeks. you can analytically solve for how much iron ore you will need in the next hour, what the optimal ratio of copper wire to plastic bar assemblers is for a circuit factory, etc. unless you play with friends, there are no pesky humans to interfere with your perfectly optimized design.
- dragontamer 5y ago> factorio is pretty complex for a video game, but trivial compared to a real world supply chain. But Factorio is more complicated than what can be typically described in say... the 470 posts in this topic thus far. As such, Factorio is "closer to reality" than the discussion (at least, than the discussion without Factorio being used as a crutch). I'm using Factorio to elevate the argument closer to reality. Rather than using a crappier hypothetical example in the abstract.