Start from a workbook
Build a model straight from your Excel workbook: check how eode read each sheet, agree the reading, and later edit the model's inputs in your own sheets.
Where: New Model→Basic→Upload or select relevant datasources
Attach a workbook while you describe your business and eode builds the model from your own sheets. It reads every sheet first and shows you how it understood each one. Nothing is designed until you agree that reading.
How a workbook becomes a model
| Step | What happens |
|---|---|
| 1 Describe | Say what to optimize and attach one dataset: the workbook. Import several files together if the data is spread across them; they become one dataset |
| 2 Clarify | eode reads your sheets (Reading your data). You check the reading on four pages and click Design on this reading. Questions follow if anything is still open |
| 3 Build | Designing, then the design to sign off: Confirm and map your workbook (Review the design) |
| 4 Load data | Your rows are mapped into the model and you check where every row went. Build and solve builds the model on your own rows (Load your data) |
| 5 Solve | Your baseline, on your rows |
A set of CSV tables brought in under Advanced follows the same path (New model).
Wait for the reading
Next on Describe starts the reading in the background, and the Clarify intro says so: "Reading your data: Read 4 of 12 sheets. Next shows the reading as it goes." Click Next to watch it: Reading your data counts the sheets, then the first page opens by itself. You can leave: after 90 seconds, Stop waiting and go back returns you to the start of the wizard: "The reading carries on in the background. Press Next here when it is done, or come back later." The model's page also offers Check the reading while it runs or waits for you.
| You see | Do |
|---|---|
| "The reading stopped before anything was read, most likely because the server running it restarted. Next reads it again." | Next on Describe, or Read again |
| "The reading stopped before it finished…" with what was found | Use what was read, or Read again |
| "The attached data has no rows to read. Attach a workbook with data on Describe and press Next." | Attach a workbook with data |
| "The reading of your data could not start. Press Next on Describe to try again." | Next on Describe |
| "No reading of your data is on this model yet." | Attach the data on Describe and press Next |
Check how each sheet was read
Your data, as I read it is the first page: "This is how I read each one; correct me where I am wrong. Nothing is designed until you say the reading is right." Every click saves straight away. Each sheet has a card: what RIA took it to be, its rows, and why, with a chip for how sure it is: SURE, LIKELY or GUESSING. The highlighted button is RIA's own proposal.
- Use it for a sheet the model should read; Set it aside for one it shouldn't, like a results tab.
- Change reopens your choice; Cancel keeps it. A choice you changed says "(you changed this)".
- Use all sheets uses every sheet at once. "You can still set any sheet aside afterwards."
Next waits only for the sheets RIA is guessing about: "Next waits for the sheet I am guessing about: use it, or set it aside." A card also says when the reading didn't reach everything: "Quick read only: I did not get to read this sheet in detail.", columns past the part it read ("Nothing in them reaches the design."), sheets past the first 40, or a table read out of a report sheet, with where in the sheet it came from.
Fix where the names come from
WHERE THE NAMES COME FROM, above the sheets, shows the four lists the model is named from: Products, Customers, Sites and Periods. Each shows the sheet and column it was found in and a few of its values, or Not in this workbook. Click Change on a list to pick another sheet and column; the values are read again. Not in this workbook marks it missing.
Name the parts of the model
What to call things: "The model is built from parts, and each part carries a name from your business. Pick one of your sheets, or type the word you use; nothing is built under a name you did not give." Each question reads "What should the model call…" a part, such as the stock held at each site. Pick an offered name (one of your sheets, or a word like Stock at each site), or type your own in "Or type your own name" and click Use my name. Change reopens a name. Next waits for every name.
Say what you want to decide
What you want to decide asks "In one sentence, what decision should this model help you make?" — "Your data shows what your business looks like; it does not say what you want to work out." The box starts from what you wrote on Describe, or from a proposal such as "Decide the best plan for 12 products and 2 sites over 13 periods, using the data I agreed." Rewrite it in your words. It's recorded as yours.
Say how long the plan is, as in "Plan for one week: …" or "over 8 quarters". The design takes its periods from these words: a cadence word alone, such as "weekly", makes it assume 13 weeks, which you then decide on the design card (Review the design).
Settle the columns and terms
The columns and the terms shows a table for each sheet you're using: Column, I read it as, Names, Unit and Sure. "Correct any row; the ones I could not settle are marked."
| To | Click |
|---|---|
| Answer a term RIA couldn't settle | One of the offered answers, or type in "Or type your own answer" and Use my answer |
| Correct a column | Correct, then pick what it names (a product, a customer, a site, a period, a number, free text, something else) and type its unit |
| Leave a column out | Don't use this column. It shows struck through, "Set aside by you, kept as context"; Use it brings it back |
| Leave many out | Set aside the 12 period columns, or Keep only… one figure column. Use them all again undoes it |
Next waits for every unsettled term: "Settle the terms I could not read first."
Answer what your sheets imply
Below the tables, some workbooks raise questions. Next doesn't wait for these; until you answer, the model holds those items back and says so.
| Section | Asks | Answer |
|---|---|---|
| What kind of item each is | Items whose type the model doesn't know, has none, or finished goods with no order policy | raw materials, components, subassemblies or finished goods; made to stock or made to order |
| Where your equipment works | Equipment at a place where routes both start and end | "It loads the routes leaving" or "It receives the routes arriving at" that place |
| What makes what you sell | Ordered items no sheet makes, buys or sources | Pick the place under Made at, tick what it's made from, Confirm. One in makes one out. Take it back undoes it |
| Where stock can wait between the steps | The kinds of production step on your routing sheet | Name each kind (the same name merges two), tick stock may wait after it, Confirm |
Answer names and shares that read two ways
Two kinds of question on this page do hold Next:
- Names written more than one way: "Your workbook writes these names more than one way, and the model joins rows only on one exact spelling." Say for each whether it's one thing and which spelling to keep. Names that differ only in spaces or dashes are merged unless you say otherwise; Next waits for the ones that differ in case.
- Shares: columns of shares (an availability, a derate, a target) whose figures read two ways, or hold a figure no share can be. Say how the column reads, and give each figure off it its share of 1, or leave it out: "nothing is rescaled for you."
Decide what your data doesn't say
The last page, What your data does not say (rail: What is missing), lists each thing the model needs that your sheets don't carry: "Decide each one; nothing is assumed without your say."
| Answer | What happens |
|---|---|
| Assume it, with my consent | RIA's proposed value is used: "Written to Assumed as consented." |
| Type your own answer | Say which sheet or column holds it, or type it in your words, then Save answer: "Written to Rules, source: you." |
| Scope it out | "Left out on purpose. The model will not carry it." |
| Stop here | "The walk stops here. Come back with the data; the model waits at this step." Pick any other answer to go on |
A long explanation folds behind Show more.
Agree the reading
The four pages are rows in the step rail; open any of them. On the last page, Next is Design on this reading (Reading your data against the model). It checks every page:
| It says | Do |
|---|---|
| "Decide the sheets I am guessing about first." | Use it or Set it aside on each |
| "Name the parts of the model under 'What to call things' first." | Give every name |
| "Say in one sentence what you want to decide." | Write the sentence |
| "Settle the terms I could not read first." | Answer each term |
| "Say which spelling to keep for each name your workbook writes more than one way, under 'Names written more than one way', first." | Answer each name |
| "Give every gap a disposition first." | Answer each gap |
| "Take the Stop away first, or come back with the data." | Pick another answer on the gap marked Stop here |
| "Only one dataset can be read into a model today…" | Go back to Describe and keep one dataset |
Once agreed, Clarify goes on to its questions, or straight to the build. The pages stay readable but locked: "You agreed this reading; the model follows it." Above the questions, "Your data as agreed on" the date says how many sheets are used and lists what was set aside. Change what is used asks Change what is used from your data?: the questions, build, data and baseline are redone, but "Your data is not read again, and what you set aside is still there to take back." Go back to the reading reopens the first page; your answers are cleared.
Load a revised workbook with a new sheet
At step 4, Load a revised workbook takes a corrected copy. When it adds a sheet the reading didn't have, the reading opens on just that sheet: "the sheets you agreed stay as they are." Agreed before lists the rest. Next waits for your word on every added sheet.
- On a model that's already built: "Your model is built, so this sheet cannot change it. Set it aside, or build again to design the model with it." Build again asks Change the description? first: it discards your Clarify answers and notes, the design, the build, the data you loaded and the solves, and reads the description again. Discard and read it again goes ahead; Keep the description as it was backs out.
- When the sheet changes the model's products, customers, sites or periods: "Use it, and the design is drawn again with it for you to confirm before your data loads." The button reads Design again with this sheet.
- Otherwise the button is Map my data into the model.
Edit your inputs in your own workbook
Where: Overview→Model Design→Your model, described→Download your inputs
A model built from a workbook keeps your layout. Your model, described adds: "Your inputs in your own workbook: your sheets and columns with the values the model holds, and for each row where it came from, its class and a note. Edit the values, then upload the file to update the model."
- Click Download your inputs. You get your own sheets with three added columns: Source (the sheet and row, or assumed), Class and Note (why a row isn't in the model).
- Edit values in Excel. Keep every sheet and column the model reads.
- Click Upload edited inputs and pick the file (Reading your inputs).
What changed then lists every change in your own words: "Kept as version 3 of your data.", each cell as
Orders, row 14, Quantity: 40 to 55 (an empty cell reads blank), Rows added and Rows removed.
Review the mapping opens step 4, so the next Build and solve uses the new rows. The same card is on
steps 3 and 5 of the wizard. A refused upload changes nothing.
| It says | Means |
|---|---|
| "Your edited workbook has no Orders sheet. The model reads it: put it back and upload again." | A sheet or column the model reads is gone |
| "Nothing in your inputs changed, so the model stays as it is." | No change found |
| "This model was mapped before edited inputs could be read back. Map it once from the Load data step, then upload your edited inputs again." | Map it again at step 4 first |
| "Your edited inputs could not be read." | The file couldn't be opened; try again |
Change a scenario's values in your sheets
Where: Scenarios→a what-if→Edit your sheets
On a what-if (not Base) of a model built from a workbook: "Change values from your workbook for this scenario." Edit your sheets opens the inputs panel with your own sheets: "Change values from your workbook above, then Save. They land on this scenario only." Then Run scenario; see Edit data. If no sheet can be edited there: "None of your workbook's sheets can be changed here" — each of their rows becomes more than one row of the model.
Limits
- One dataset per model.
- The reading takes the first 40 sheets and up to 240 columns per sheet, and stops after 6 minutes; sheets it didn't reach keep their quick read.
- Up to 8 gaps, 6 offered names per part, 12 questions per section below the columns, and 30 names written more than one way.
- A typed name is one line of up to 80 characters; a unit up to 160.
- Workbooks are
.xlsx, through a 100 MB upload limit. - What changed lists up to 200 changes of each kind; the counts are complete.
Related
- Describe your business: attach the workbook
- Load your data: where every row went
- Import data: how a workbook becomes a dataset
- Edit data: change numbers in a solved model