Ventana software support forum

Hello Ventana Systems folks, As you know, we have a mature and sophisticated Vensim model, the Energy Policy Simulator. Most of the variables in the model are subscripted in various ways. For example, some existing variables use the following three subscripts: [Industry Category, Industry Process Em...

I just downloaded a fresh copy of Model Reader (still numbered 7.3.6) and tested it today. It looks like it's working perfectly, and the behavior saving .cin files from the .vpm executable now matches the behavior when saving .cin files from the .mdl executable. I tested saving a simple package, and...

Fantastic- that's great to hear!

It's been a little while, so I thought I would just check in and see if there has been any luck fixing the last part of this bug. We're so close to having this long-standing bug solved, at which point the .vpm files will behave like the .mdl files! I tried to be thorough in providing test results, a...

Hi folks, The Model Reader 7.3.6 update improves the problem but does not fix it completely. Data read in from "GET DIRECT CONSTANTS" no longer appears in the .cin file, which is good. However, variables that are read into the model using "GET DIRECT LOOKUPS" are still included i...

Awesome! I am really happy you managed to track it down and are already testing a fix!

Important: Also, I can confirm Tony's finding that the bug affects Vensim DSS when opening the VPM file, but not the MDL file . So it doesn't seem to be a problem with Model Reader specifically, but rather, a problem affecting compiled (.vpm) versions of the model, but not affecting uncompiled (.mdl...

Writing all of the values that were read using "GET DIRECT X" calls into .cin files is definitely not how Vensim historically has handled the writing of .cin files, in any version of Vensim, at least back to when I started using Vensim in 2013. It's also not how the current versions of Ven...

Hello Ventana Systems folks, I've been able to track down a bug that has been troubling us for some time and isolate a procedure that reproduces the bug reliably. The bug is specific to Vensim Model Reader and doesn't affect Vensim DSS. When saving a .cin file (changes only), Model Reader (including...

Hello JJ, Thank you so much for the suggestion and the sample model. It is an exceedingly clever approach, and it has enabled me to solve my problem. You are awesome. For anyone else reading this thread in the future, although JJ's example pulls data from VDF files, his approach also works for other...

Hi Tom, I tried this approach. It works for selecting numerical values, but it fails when trying to select strings. Vensim gives the error: Argument 1 to function VECTOR ELM MAP must be a normal variable. In your example, your third line is: ConstVal[city] = 4,5,6 But I need to select file paths, wh...

In the post above, the first code block was supposed to read:
(I know this code doesn't work, it's just an example of simple syntax.)

Thanks, Tom. The elements I care about are already subscripted, so I'll look into the workaround involving VECTOR ELM MAP. I assume the goal is to be able to save a constant value into the .cin file instead of a string, because we know that Vensim handles contants in .cin files successfully. Is VECT...

Hi folks, Your suggestion works when using the "Sim Control" button to select the .cin file prior to simulation, but it fails if I try to load the .cin file once I'm already in SyntheSim mode. (The change to the string variable is silently ignored when loading the .cin file once already in...

I am curious if there is a way to get Vensim to read the paths (or at least the filenames) of CSV input data files from a different input data file, and then to use those filenames in a GET DIRECT DATA equation. This would allow for a user to change which input data files are read into my model by c...

I can confirm that Vensim 7.1 allows allocation to work correctly even when the widths are significantly smaller than the priorities. (Also, like Vensim 7.0, it does not crash upon using the "Simulate" button on EPS 1.3.0.) So as far as I can tell, Vensim 7.1 addresses all known issues reg...

Adjusting the widths to be similar in magnitude to the priorities fixes the allocation problem in Vensim 7.0. It does not fix the crash bug in Vensim v6.3G. So the two issues are unrelated. Therefore, I guess we're at the point where everything is working in Vensim 7.0, but not in the versions earli...

On further investigation, it does have to do with the widths (the standard deviations of the bell curves). For ships, rail, and aircraft, we don't distinguish them by technology type (as we do for on-road vehicle modes). 100% of them get allocated to the "nonroad vehicle" technology type. ...

There is something wrong with the way Vensim 7.0 is performing the "ALLOCATE AVAILABLE" function in the variable named "New Vehicles Allocated by Technology". It is not allocating any of the airplanes, freight ships, or rail, even though there is capacity for them to be allocated...

Well, it runs under Vensim 7.0 without crashing, but the results look crazy. Take a look at these graphs comparing CO2 Emissions by Vehicle Type, generated from Vensim 6.4E and Vensim 7.0. Both are running the same model with the same input data. Vensim 6.4E VehEmissions-Vensim6.4E.PNG Vensim 7.0 Ve...

Okay, well, let me upgrade my Vensim DSS Windows installation to 7.0 and make sure the model works for me. If it does, then let's talk about getting a new version of the Linux shared object.

We are using five subscripts on some variables now (Vehicle Type, Pollutant, Cargo Type, Vehicle Technology, Transportation Fuel), whereas I think the maximum number of subscripts we ever applied to a single variable in 1.2.4 (and earlier) was three or four. So that is one design difference between ...

There were a lot of changes made at once to the model (going from 1.2.4 to 1.3.0) because I removed the entire Transportation sector and rebuilt it from scratch. So there was a significant period of model construction during which the model did not run (as not all the new variables and equations wer...

I'm pretty sure DropBox isn't the cause of the problem. I've had DropBox forever, and it never caused Vensim to crash on any prior version of the Energy Policy Simulator (EPS). And with EPS version 1.3.0, it crashes reliably even if I disable DropBox. It does sound like something that may have been ...

Here is the exact sequence of events: 1. I open the model in Vensim DSS by double-clicking the .mdl file. 2. I click the "Simulate" button. 3. If there already exists a file named "MostRecentRun.vdf" from a previous model run (using SyntheSim), a dialogue appears stating "Da...