Depending on the settings made by the Project Manager, the Step Function graph and the resulting priority may vary depending on whether the Piecewise Linear option is enabled or not.
The graph below shows the Step Function when the Piecewise Linear option is enabled.
- The x-axis is the data for the alternative being evaluated
- The y-axis is the corresponding priority
The graph above shows that the slope from one point (delta priority/delta x value) is increasing.
The data can be entered by dragging the handle of the vertical slider or typing on the textbox provided. From our example, the data entered is 40 and the resulting priority is 40%.
When the Piecewise Linear option is disabled on the same Step function scale used above, the graph will be:
The Step Function graph is now different from the first one; the slope from one point to the next is now equal to zero.
Having the same data as 40, the resulting priority is now 25% (this was 40% when Piecewise Linear was enabled).
