"The word model is used as a noun, adjective, and verb, and in each instance it has a slightly different connotation. As a noun "model" is a representation in the sense in which an architect constructs a small-scale model of a building or a physicist a large-scale model of an atom. As an adjective "model" implies a degree of perfection or idealization, as in reference to a model home, a model student, or a model husband. As an adjective "model" implies a degree or perfection or idealization, as in reference to a model home, a model student, or a model husband. As a verb "to model" means to demonstrate, to reveal, to show what a thing is like."
Linear programming (LP), also called linear optimization, is a method to achieve the best outcome in a mathematical model whose requirements and objective are represented by linear relationships. Linear programming is a special case of mathematical programming.
"Linear programming is viewed as a revolutionary development giving man the ability to state general objectives and to find, by means of the simplex method, optimal policy decisions for a broad class of practical decision problems of great complexity. In the real world, planning tends to be ad hoc because of the many special-interest groups with their multiple objectives."
"Linear relationships can be captured with a straight line on a graph. Linear relationships are easy to think about....Linear equations are solvable... Linear systems have an important modular virtue: you can take them apart, and put them together again — the pieces add up."
"There are two types of systems engineering - basis and applied. There is no need to attempt to define the term systems engineering in a manner acceptable to everybody, as Chalmer Jones brings out in his article herein. Systems engineering is, obviously, the engineering of a system. It usually, but not always, includes dynamic analysis, mathematical models, simulation, linear programming, data logging, computing, optimating, etc., etc. It connotes an optimum method, realized by modern engineering techniques. Basic systems engineering includes not only the control system but also all equipments within the system, including all host equipments for the control system. Applications engineering is — and always has been — all the engineering required to apply the hardware of a hardware manufacturer to the needs of the customer. Such applications engineering may include, and always has included where needed, dynamic analysis, mathematical models, simulation, linear programming, data logging, computing, and any technique needed to meet the end purpose - the fitting of an existing line of production hardware to a customers needs. This is applied systems engineering."
"Linear Programming is a generalization of Linear Algebra. It is capable of handling a variety of problems, ranging from finding schedules for airlines or movies in a theater to distributing oil from refineries to markets. The reason for this great versatility is the ease at which constraints can be incorporated into the model."
"There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and ITT and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those are the nations of the world today. What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state — Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical decision theories, minimax solutions, and compute the price-cost probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do. We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has been since man crawled out of the slime. And our children will live, Mr. Beale, to see that perfect world in which theres no war or famine, oppression or brutality — one vast and ecumenical holding company, for whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties tranquilized, all boredom amused."
"In another part of the management forest, the mechanistic school was gathering its forces and preparing to outflank the forces of light. First came the numbers men — the linear programmers, the budget experts, and the financial analysts — with their PERT systems and cost-benefit analyses. From another world, unburdened by most of the scientific management ideology and untouched by the human relations school, they began to parcel things out and give some meaning to those truisms, "plan ahead" and "keep records." Armed with emerging systems concepts, they carried the "mechanistic" analogy to its fullest—and it was very productive. Their work still goes on, largely untroubled by organizational theory; the theory, it seems clear, will have to adjust to them, rather than the other way around."