Network reliability evaluation

This article, beyond presenting a spectrum of network reliability methods studied in the past decades, describes a scalable innovative ‘overlap technique’ to tackle large complex networks' reliability evaluation difficulties, which cannot be handled by straightforward reliability block diagramming (RBD) techniques used for the simple parallel-series topologies. Examples are shown on how to apply the overlap algorithm to compute the ingress-egress reliability. Monte Carlo simulations demonstrate the methods discussed. (1) Static (time independent), (2) dynamic (time dependent) using a versatile Weibull distribution to represent the multiple stages of network components from infancy to useful life period and to wear-out, and (3) multistate versions to include derated behavior beyond conventional working and nonworking states, are illustrated for calculating the directional source-target (s-t) reliability of complex networks by using the Java software ERBDC: Exact Reliability Block Diagramming Calculator. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website.