NETWORK ANALYSIS

NETWORK ANALYSIS
A network is a set of points called nodes and set of
curves called branches or arcs or links that connect
certain pair of nodes. Network analysis is an important
tool for effective management decision problem with
respect to formulating, planning, scheduling and
controlling projects in order to ensure the completion of
the project within the set time.
NETWORK ANALYSIS
Networks are a useful modeling construct for
representing a variety of problems, especially where
we are attempting to model some type of flow -
material flow; transportation flows; communication
flows; etc
• Can be physical networks: transportation networks
such as railroads and highways)
• Network flows sometimes also arise in surprising
ways (problems that on the surface might not appear
to involve any networks at all).
NETWORK ANALYSIS
A lot of activities take place whenever a project is being
undertaken. Some of these activities are inter-related
with some of them being done simultaneously and others
are done one after the other.
Network analysis involves representing all the various
categories of activities involved in project planning and
scheduling in diagrammatic form to give visual impact to
the inter-relationship among the activities and also to
reveal some important information about the project.
NETWORK ANALYSIS

Fig. 1
GRAPHS & NETWORKS
Network problems are defined on graphs
See fig. 1 a net work of five nodes, labeled A through E and
six branches defined by the curves AB, AC, AD, BC, CD and DE
A branch is oriented if it has a direction with it
See fig.2 – Undirected and fig.3 -directed graphs
G = (N, A) where N=set of nodes and A=set of feasible links/
arcs. Schematically, directions are indicated by arrows. The
arrow on branch AB in fig.1 signifies that any movement along
this branch must originate at A and terminate at B, movement
from B to A is not permitted. Two branches are connected if
they have a common node.
GRAPHS AND NETWORKS
In fig.1 for instance AB, AC and AD are connected
because they have a common node at A. AB and CD is
not connected. A path is a sequence of connected
branches or activity from start to end. A network is a
sequence of activity and events. A network is connected
if for each pair of nodes in the network there exist at
least one path joining the pair. If the path is unique for
each pair of nodes the connected network is called a
tree. See fig.4.
GRAPHS AND NETWORKS
In fig.1 ED, DA, AB is a path, but the sequence connected
branches CA, AD, DC, CB is not a path as node C occurs
in it twice.
Sometimes the nodes and arcs have a temporal
dimension that models activities that take place over
time see fig.5. Many scheduling applications have this
flavor (crew scheduling; location and layout theory;
warehousing and distribution; production planning and
control)
THREE FUNDAMENTAL FLOW PROBLEMS
The shortest path problem: One supply node and one demand
node; problem is to send one unit of flow from supply node to the
demand node, where the arc costs are the "length" of the arc.

Longest path problem: same as shortest path, but now want to find
longest path from supply node to demand node.
The minimum cost flow problem: Find the network flow that
satisfies demand at demand nodes at minimum cost, given the
network structure, and capacities, and supply at supply nodes.
The maximum flow problem: One supply node and one demand
node. Given the arc capacities, the problem is to determine the
maximum amount of flow that the network can handle from the
supply node to the demand node.
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
This involves a set of nodes and a set of proposed
branches none of them oriented. Each proposed branch
has a non-negative cost associated with it. The objective
is to construct a connected network that contains all the
nodes and is such that the sum of the cost associated
these branches actually used is a minimum. This problem
is always solved by a tree (if two nodes in a connected
network are joined by two paths, one of these paths
must contain a branch where removal does not
disconnect the network)
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
A minimum spanning tree may be found by initially
selecting any one node and determining which branch
incident on the selected node has the smallest cost. This
branch is accepted as part of the final network. The
network is then completed iteratively. At each stage of
the iterative process attention is focused on those nodes
already linked together. All branches linking these nodes
to the unconnected nodes are considered and the
cheapest of such branch is identified. The branch is
accepted as part of the final network. The iterative
process terminates when all nodes have been linked.
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
Example:
Solve the minimum span problem for the network given fig.6. These
numbers on the branches represent the costs of including the
branches in the final network.
Solution:
1. Arbitrarily choose A as the starting nodes.
2. Consider all branches incident on A: AE, AB. AD, and AC with costs 10, 2, 1,
and 4 respectively.
3. Since AD is the cheapest, we add this branch to the solution as shown in
fig.7. Connect nodes A and D.
4. Next consider all branches incident on either A or D that
connect other nodes. Such branches are AE, AB, AC, DB,
DF, DG and DC with costs 10, 2, 4, 1, 7, 10, 7 and 4
respectively. DB is the cheapest so it is included.
5. Consider all branches incident on A, B, or D that connect
to other nodes. These are AE, AC, DE, DF, DG and DC with
costs 10, 4, 7, 10, 7, 4. The cheapest branch is AC or DC.
Arbitrarily select DC.
6. Consider all branches incident on A, B, C or D. These are
AE, CG, DE, DF and DG with costs 10, 3, 7, 10 and 7. The
cheapest branch is CG. Adjoin it to the new fig. 7.
7. Consider all branches incident on A, B, D, C and G. These
are AE, DE, DF, GE and GF with costs 10, 7, 10, 5 and 3.
The cheapest is GF. Select GF and adjoin.
8. Consider all branches incident on A, B, C, D or G. These
are AE, AE, DE and GE with costs 10, 7 and 5. The
cheapest is GE. Connect it.
9. Since Fig.7 has all the nodes included, the minimum span
network has been obtained.
Hence the minimum cost for connecting the network is:
Zm = 1+1+4+3+3+5 = 17.
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
The National Park Service plans to develop a
desert area for tourism. Four locations in the area
are designated for automobile access. These sites
and the distances (km) between them are listed in
the table 1 (below).
To inflict the least harm on the environment, the park
service wants to minimize the km of the road way
required to provide the desired accessibility.
Determine how roads should be built to achieve the
objective.
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
Park Wild Falls Majestic Sunset The
Entrance Rock Rock Meadow
Park 7.1 19.5 19.1 25.7
Entrance
Wild Falls 7.1 8.3 16.2 13.2

Majestic 19.5 8.3 18.1 5.2

Rock
Sunset 19.1 16.2 18.1 17.2
Rock
The 25.7 13.2 5.2 17.2
Meadow
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
The table is 1st represented schematically.
This is a minimum-span problem. The nodes are the four locations to be developed
and the park entrance, while the proposed branches are the possible roadways
linking the sites. The costs are the mileages.
THE MINIMUM COST FLOW PROBLEM
1. Select park entrance as the initial node. The costs of the branches incident
on this node are listed: PW, PS, PM, PT. The cheapest is 7.1. Add this to the
network.
2. Consider all branches incident on P and W. These are PS, PM, PT, WS, WM,
WT with costs: 19.1, 19.5, 25.7, 16.2, 8.3, and 18.2 respectively. The
cheapest is 8.3. WM is added to the network.
3. Consider all the branches incident on P, W an M. These are PS, PT, WS, WT,
MS, MT with costs 19.1, 25.7, 16.2 13.2, 18.1, and 5.2 respectively. The
cheapest is 5.2. MT is added to the network.
4. Consider all the branches incident on P, W, M and T. Ps, WS, MS, TS with
costs 19.1, 16.2, 18.1, and 17.2 respectively. The cheapest is 16.2. Add
WS to the network since all the nodes have been connected, Fig 4 gives
final network, having a minimal cost of;
Zm = 7.1 + 8.3 + 5.2 + 16.2 = 36.8 km.
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
Q1. A park has recently been set aside for a limited
amount of sightseeing and backpack hiking. Cars are not
allowed into the park, but there is a narrow, winding road
system for trains and for jeep drivers by the pack rangers.
This road system is shown below.
Location O is the entrance into the park. Other letters
designate the locations of ranger stations and other limited
facilities.
The numbers give the distances of these winding roads in
km. the park contains a scenic wonder at station T. A small
number of trains are used to transport sightseers from the
pack entrance to station T and back.
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
The park management currently faces three problems;
A. One is to determine which route from the park entrance to station T has the shortest total
distance for the opn of the trains. (use shortest route)
B. The 2nd problem is that phone lines must be installed under the roads to establish telephone
communication among all the stations (including the park entrance). Because the installation
is both expensive and disruptive to the natural environment, lines would be installed under
just enough roads to provide some connection between every pair of stations. The question
is, where should the lines be laid to accomplish this with minimum no. of km line installed?
(The minimum spanning tree problem).
C. The 3rd problem is that more people want to take train ride from park entrance to station T
than can be accommodated during the peak season. To avoid unduly disturbing the
ecology and wildlife of the region, a strict ration has been placed on the number of train
trips that can be made on each of the roads per day. These limits differ for the different
roads. Therefore, the peak season, various routes might be followed regardless of distance
to increase the number of train trips that can be made each day. The question is, how do
you route various trips to increase the number of trips that can be made per day without
violating the limit in any individual road?
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
Solution
A. (i)

(ii)

B. The park has 7 nodes; the network to be obtained must have (n-1) or 6
links. There must be no cycles to qualify as a spanning tree.
The nodes and the distances for the problem are shown. The thin lines
represent potential links.
 SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS

Solution:
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
1. Select node O to start. The unconnected node closest to O is A.
connect node A to node O
2. The unconnected node closest to either node O or A is node B
(closest to node A). Connect node B to node A.
3. The unconnected node closest to O, A or B is node C (closest to B)
connect node C to node B.
4. The unconnected node closest to node O, A, B or C is node E
(closest to B), connect node E to node B
5. The unconnected node closest to node O, A, B, C or E is node D
(closest to E), connect node D to node E.
6. The only remaining unconnected node is node T. it is closest to
node D, connect node T to node D.
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
All nodes are connected, this solution is the desired optimal. The total length of the
links is 14km. the minimum spanning problem falls into the broad category of network
design. In this category, the objective is to appropriate network for the given
application (frequently involving transportation systems) rather than analyzing an
already designed network.
C. This is an example of the maximum flow problem
SHORTEST ROUTE PROBLEMS
The objective is to route the various train trips from the park
entrance (station O) to the scenic wonder (station T) to maximize
the number of trips per day, at the peak season.
Each train will return by the same route it took, on the outgoing
trip. So the analysis focuses on the outgoing trips only. Strict upper
limits have been set or imposed on the number of outgoing trips
allowed per day in the outbound direction on each individual road.
For each road, the direction of travel for outgoing trips is indicated
by an arrow.
The number at the base of the arrow gives the upper limit on the
number of outgoing trips per day.