Modelling with Xpress

Xpress-IVE: overview

Xpress-IVE is a graphical user interface to Xpress and, by default, has four panes. Panes within the window can be re-sized or "un-pinned" so that they auto-hide. If you want to retrieve a pane after un-pinning it, you can click the appropriate pin or use the View menu. If you get into a real mess, just click on the button to recover the original layout!

The left pane is the project bar
Here Xpress-IVE displays information about the various entities used in the Mosel programme. For a given entity,
- Hover with the mouse to see brief information about the entity
- Click once with the mouse to mark the lines in the Mosel programme where the entity is used.
- Double-click with the mouse to open up a (scrollable) window giving all the values associated with the entity.
The bottom pane is the info bar
Here Xpress-IVE displays compile-time and run-time information, in particular error messages.
The right pane is the run bar.
Here Xpress-IVE displays run-time data. This is available by clicking on the appropriate tab.
- Output/Input displays values written from the programme
- Stats gives run-time stats, in particular the current status of the solution process.
- Matrix gives various views of the constraint matrix, in particular the "Graphical original" view. This makes more sense if you give names to all your constraints.
- Solutions indicates how the objective vaule changes with time as the solver runs. This problem (and most formulated in this course) will solve too quickly for this to be of interest. Not that it's of great relevance anyway: just something to click on when you're bored or looking for inspiration!
- Objective indicates how the objective vaule changes with time as the solver runs. This problem (and most formulated in this course) will solve too quickly for this to be of interest. Not that it's of great relevance anyway: just something to click on when you're bored or looking for inspiration!
- MIP search indicates the progress of the solution process when Xpress is applied to mixed-integer programming problems.
- BB tree illustrates the branch-and-bound tree. Interesting to see a "real" one and can be useful to see why one branch-and-bound strategy works better than another for a particular problem.
- User graph indicates the graph that has been plotted by the user from within the Mosel programme.
- IIS is not applicable to this course.
The centre pane is the place where the working file will be displayed.
As an editor, it is a lot like Microsoft Word.

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