1. In order for a student to be able to submit coursework from home the components of a complex system must all function and interconnect appropriately. To consider a simplified form of this system: the student requires a functioning source of power (inc leads/adapters etc.), a laptop, and a viable connection to the internet and it is also necessary that the IT systems of the university are running without disruption. It may be assumed that, on any given day, the components of the system have the following probabilities of functioning appropriately: (1) power source - probability of functioning 0.99 (ii) laptop - probability of functioning 0.98 internet connection - probability of functioning 0.965 (iv) university IT systems - probability of functioning 0.985 You are asked to perform the following calculations to investigate the probability of successful submission on the deadline day - the principal calculation is a simulation approximation. Carry out a simple Monte Carlo Simulation exercise to model the simplified submission 'system'. Simulate 5000 submission attempts. Use a random number generator based on a uniform distribution to represent the operational status (functioning or not) of each component and from this calculate the number of successful submissions in your sample of 5000. Explicitly calculate the fraction/percentage of successful submissions (this represents the probability of a successful submission on any given day) - highlight the cells in which you obtain these results and write a brief explanation of your calculations and conclusions in neighbouring cells (ensure that this is in cells near the top of your spreadsheet - in the first 10 rows). In addition, perform a very simple calculation in Excel (again near the top of the spreadsheet) to calculate the exact probability of a successful submission and write a brief explanation/comparison with the simulation result. Credit will be awarded for an easy to read spreadsheet (assume that you are presenting it as a very brief electronic report). 1. In order for a student to be able to submit coursework from home the components of a complex system must all function and interconnect appropriately. To consider a simplified form of this system: the student requires a functioning source of power (inc leads/adapters etc.), a laptop, and a viable connection to the internet and it is also necessary that the IT systems of the university are running without disruption. It may be assumed that, on any given day, the components of the system have the following probabilities of functioning appropriately: (1) power source - probability of functioning 0.99 (ii) laptop - probability of functioning 0.98 internet connection - probability of functioning 0.965 (iv) university IT systems - probability of functioning 0.985 You are asked to perform the following calculations to investigate the probability of successful submission on the deadline day - the principal calculation is a simulation approximation. Carry out a simple Monte Carlo Simulation exercise to model the simplified submission 'system'. Simulate 5000 submission attempts. Use a random number generator based on a uniform distribution to represent the operational status (functioning or not) of each component and from this calculate the number of successful submissions in your sample of 5000. Explicitly calculate the fraction/percentage of successful submissions (this represents the probability of a successful submission on any given day) - highlight the cells in which you obtain these results and write a brief explanation of your calculations and conclusions in neighbouring cells (ensure that this is in cells near the top of your spreadsheet - in the first 10 rows). In addition, perform a very simple calculation in Excel (again near the top of the spreadsheet) to calculate the exact probability of a successful submission and write a brief explanation/comparison with the simulation result. Credit will be awarded for an easy to read spreadsheet (assume that you are presenting it as a very brief electronic report)
