Hello Analytica Users!

Just in time, here is the April edition of the Analytica newsletter, the place to stay up-to-date with special Analytica tips and hints, new features and releases, webinars and coaching, interesting applications and case studies, and books or seminars on modeling.  We'd appreciate your comments, requests, or contributions for future newsletters.

Thanks,
Paul Sanford
Analytica Newsletter Editor

Analytica model helps ICE Energy close $100M deal

ICE Energy of Colorado manufactures cooling equipment that freezes water into ice at night and melts the ice to cool buildings during the day -- shifting electrical load from the daytime demand peak to nighttime when demand is low and power is cheaper.  In February, the company signed a $100 million deal for 6,000 of their "Ice Bear" units with the Southern California Public Power Authority for use at 1,500 locations in their Los Angeles service area.  A sophisticated Analytica model developed by ICE Energy's CTO, Brian Parsonnet, helped customers assess the value of this innovative energy storage technology. See Brian Parsonnet's recent Analytica user webinar on analyzing weather data with Analytica.

Come visit us at the Uptime Symposium in New York

Lumina is presenting and exhibiting at the annual Uptime Institute IT Symposium,  an event focusing on Data Center Efficiency and Green Enterprise Information Technology.  This year's meeting will be held at the New York Hilton, May 17 - 19.  Efficient management of enterprise IT resources is a complex challenge involving major investments, using increasing amounts of power, amid large uncertainties in future demand and technology evolution.  Lumina's CEO, Dr. Max Henrion, will present an innovative approach to this challenge using Analytica's Datacenter Capacity Planning Tool (ADCAPT).  His talk on using Sustainable and Scalable Capacity Planning to cope with massive uncertainty is on Tuesday 18^th May at 3:20pm.  We hope you will also visit us at booth #418. Here is a detailed profile on Max's talk. Register here to attend the exposition free of charge.

Analytica Handy Hint: Discover Alt-click!

Analytica users know that drawing influence arrows from one node to another makes it easier to define the new node.  You can then select from the Inputs Menu to insert their identifiers into your expression.  But what if the variable you want to include in your expression has not yet been linked?  There is no need to stop writing your expression to draw a new arrow.  Simply hold down the Alt key and click the desired input node. Its identifier gets inserted into your expression and the influence arrow appears. (This method works when you are editing the Definition in the Attribute Pane and the new input node is in the same diagram.) Usually when people discover this trick they wish they had known earlier.  That's why we're telling you now. Try it! Check the Analytica wiki for a list of other Keyboard Shortcuts.

New Webinar Series on Uncertainty

Do you interpret a Weibull Distribution as as a collection of toys that wobble but don't fall down?   Does your definition of a Uniform Distribution involve handing out outfits to employees?  So maybe you're a little rusty on that Statistics 1A class, or perhaps you would just like to learn how to explicitly represent uncertainty in Analytica.  The upcoming webinar series on uncertainty modeling will introduce you to one of the most powerful aspects of Analytica, with no prerequisites.  Lumina CTO, Lonnie Chrisman will present a Gentle Introduction to Modeling Uncertainty to kick off the new webinar series this Thursday, April 29^th at 10:00am PDT.  In the following weeks the series will cover Monte Carlo sampling, improving the quality of estimates, Risk Analysis, and other interesting topics. Users of all experience levels are invited to register for this webinar. Check the Wiki pages for information on upcoming webinars or to review an archive of past topics.