Simulation with Stochastic Petri-Nets

This tutorial reviews the role of Stochastic Petri Nets (SPNs) in stochastic simulation. The evolution of SPNs as a component-level state-space modeling framework is discussed. SPNs are compared to both process-based approaches to discrete event simulation (DES) and to agent-based modeling (ABM). The causes for the apparent lack of commercial success of general-purpose simulation with SPNs are analyzed along with the possibility that this situation will change in the near future. In particular, the potential is explored for SPNs to serve as a useful compromise between traditional DES and the more flexible (yet lacking standard building blocks) ABM. To this end, SPNs can be considered as a middle-ground framework with natural capabilities for modeling complex interactions among the entities comprising the system.