Allocation of Service Time in a Multiserver System

Muhammad El-Taha () and Bacel Maddah ()
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Muhammad El-Taha: Department of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Southern Maine, 96 Falmouth Street, Portland, Maine 04104-9300
Bacel Maddah: Engineering Management Program, American University of Beirut, P.O. Box 11-0236, Riad El Solh, Beirut 1107 2020, Lebanon

Management Science, 2006, vol. 52, issue 4, 623-637

Abstract: Reducing congestion is a primary concern in the design and analysis of queueing networks, especially in systems where sources of randomness are characterized by high variability. This paper considers a multiserver first-come, first-served (FCFS) queueing model where we arrange servers in two stations in series. All arrivals join the first service center, where they receive a maximum of T units of service. Arrivals with service requirements that exceed the threshold T join the second queue, where they receive their remaining service. For a variety of heavy tail service time distributions, characterized by large coefficient of variations, analytical and numerical comparisons show that our scheme provides better system performance than the standard parallel multiserver model in the sense of reducing the mean delay per customer in heavy traffic systems. Our model is likely to be useful in systems where high variability is a cause for degradation and where numerous service interruptions are not desired.

Keywords: queueing; truncated distributions; heavy tail distributions; repair models; simulation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2006
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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