Release Notes for Stella 1.6.2

These release notes list feature changes for the current release of Stella Architect, iThink Version 1.6, Stella Professional, and Stella Designer. Feature changes are also shown for previous versions of the software. There is a list of Known Issues for the current software release as well as a version by version detailing of Defects Fixed.

New and Updated Features

In 1.6.2

Optimization within Sensitivity

In addition to being able to run optimizations over sensitivity runs you can now run an optimization within each sensitivity run. This is a convenient way to see how the optimal parameters found vary based on other model parameters or noise seeds. This is set up in the Sensitivity Specs Panel

Constraint Handling in Differential Evolution

It is now possible to add constraints to differential evolution optimizations allowing the specification of inadmissible search spaces without degrading the efficiency of the search. See Optimization Specs for details on setting this up.

Find Options

The find tool now makes it easier to look for content that appears in equations and documentation by allowing you to specify search terms within these. See Find window for more details.

Managing Time Formats

A Manage option was added to the right click (Ctrl-Click) menu item for formatting items in graphs and tables. This will open the Manage Time Labels dialog box allowing you to add and modify formats as well as changing the default time format.

Table Position in Results Panel

The scroll position on the table in the Results Panel is now retained when moving between variables.

Documenting Models in the Equation Viewer

Options have been added to the Equation Viewer to make it easier to create model documentation that meets you needs. It will now display optional variable usage and provides increased control over annotation. See Equation Viewer

for more information.

Getting Outputs in the Sensitivity Parameters List

There is now an option to see both the inputs to each sensitivity run as well as the outputs in the currently displayed graph or table. See Sensitivity Parameters dialog for more detail.

In 1.6.1

Ghost Tool

If you click on an empty part of the model when using the ghost tool the Find dialog will come up allowing you to ghost a variable without first navigating to it.

Restore Window Layout

Under the Window menu on the model and the interface, the Restore Window Layout option will reset all window, panel and tool bar positions to where they were when Stella was first installed (isee systems default settings). See Window Menu

Zoom to Fit

In the Zoom control, a new option has been added to automatically adjust the zoom level of the model diagram or interface page so that all objects will be visible within the viewable space without needing to scroll. See Model Window Mode Toolbar for details.

View Results and Causal Lens

A combined View Results and Causal Lens has been added to the Online Model Editor. See Getting Started Online.

In 1.6

Global Number formatting

You can now specify a model level default number format that will be applied to all variables instead of having to do this variable by variable. This is done in the Model Settings Properties Panel. The options are the same as they are for each variable, and variables can still be set individually as well.

Currency, Prefixes and Suffixes for Formatted Numbers

Instead of limiting output formatting to use a $ or % you can now specify arbitrary prefixes and suffixes for output numbers. See Scales and Ranges Tab for more discussion.

Time Formatting and Labeling

You can now format time to display years, months and days and not simply decimal values. See Setting up Time Bounds for more discussion.

Variables Used in Graphs, Tables and Interface Objects

You can now find what graphs or tables (or interface object) a variable is used in by right clicking and selecting Find Uses on the right (Ctrl) click menu. See Context Menu for more details. You can also locate exported tables from the Export Data dialog box

Published Model Performance

The performance of published models, especially simulation speed, has been dramatically improved and will, with a modern browser, match the performance on the desktop.

Importing and Exporting Data

It is now possible to import and export data from the interface for published models. These are both set up using a Button (Interface). When the button is clicked the user will be prompted for a file to upload or save to. Only .csv files are supported on the interface. See also notes in Creating Import and Export Files.

Simulation Speed Control

The new Simulation Speed control allows you to let the interface user set the speed at which the model simulates. See Simulation Speed for more details.

Object Visibility

You can now have objects be made conditionally visible based on variable values, or the role in a multiplayer game. This allows customization of the user experience based on the state of a simulation. See Object Visibility (Interface) for more details.

Display Time

Much like the progress bar in the development environment the Display Time object shows progress during a simulation and allows the user to scrub over different times in the simulation. See Display Time (Interface) for more details.

Support for Sound

You can now add a button that will play a sound, and have a sound be played in response to a simulation event. This works the same on the desktop and for published models, though supported sound formats vary by browser. See Button (Interface) and Simulation Event Action dialog for more detail.

Documentation on the interface

You can now display equations, units of measure, and any documentation provided for a variable in a Model View. This material is displayed as the mouse moves over the elements of the model. See the Model View documentation for details.

Negative Binomial Distribution

The NEGBINOMIAL (negative binomial) builtin has been added. This returns the number of failures that occurred getting to a specific number of successes for a given probability of success. See Statistical builtins for more information.

Truncating and Sampling Distributions

You can also specify a minimum, maximum and sampling interval so that it is easy to create truncated or sample distributions in models, and truncated distributions for sensitivity. See Statistical builtins for more discussion of truncation and sampling.

Quoting of Array Dimensions and Elements

You can quote an array dimension name and element names by putting double quote around them (as in "1-2"). This capability is in place primarily to support the importation of models translated from other languages. If you do create labels with quotes the model will not work in previous versions of Stella.

Probability Density Options on Histograms

The Histogram has had options added to appear as a probability density function (pdf) and cumulative density function (cdf). See Bar Graph for further discussion.

Improved Variable Highlighting

Highlighting of variables is now easier to find even in dense models with lots of color.

Passing Parameter Information for Data Collection

It is now possible to pass parameters to a simulation set up with data collection by appending them to the URL for the model. See Data Collection for details.

Behavior and Compatibility Notes for 1.6

Note that the BINOMIAL and GEOMETRIC builtins were not behaving the way they were documented. The probability parameter was being multiplied by DT prior to execution. If you are using these with a model that has DT of 1, there will not be any change in behavior. Otherwise, multiply the probability by DT to get the same behavior. The MONTECARLO builtin will also allow you to specify a success probability that is limited to 100% per DT, not 100%*DT per DT as it previously did.

Backward Compatibility

Models from versions prior to 1.6 can be opened and saved in 1.6 then reopened in previous releases and should be unchanged. As always, new features available in 1.6 will not be recognized in previous versions. Thus, for example, additional arguments to NORMAL and other random number generators will be treated as errors in earlier versions of the software.

The new time and number formatting options introduce more complexity when models are opened in previous versions of the software. By design, if a model from version 1.5 is opened and saved in 1.6 it will reopen unchanged in version 1.5. However, if you make changes to the default number or time formats (see below) in 1.6 then those changes will be lost when opened in 1.5. When reopening in 1.6, you will need to add back in the default format changes. As you add in additional number and time formatting options this becomes more complicated and it is possible to lose additional time and number formatting information. Therefore, if you are planning to work with people using prior versions of the software it may be simplest to not set the model level defaults for time and number formatting.