Siebel Field Service Guide > Scheduling Using Siebel Scheduler >

Reloading the ABS and Optimizer Caches

Dispatchers and field service engineers can change the following specifications for service activities:

• Planned start date for an activity
• Planned end date for an activity
• Engineer assigned to an activity (in the Employees field)

NOTE:  Planned End field, Planned Completion field, and End field designate the same date. All these fields appear in the user interface.

All changes require updating the in-memory cache of the activities. If a user changes an activity in the Siebel database, then the activity is not the same as the activity in the in-memory cache. You can manually reload activity data into memory by clicking the Load button in the Activities view in the Service Region List view of the Administration - Scheduling screen. For more information, see Loading Activity Data for Service Regions.

Users can also lock the scheduled time or assignment for an activity. For more information, see Locking Assignments and Schedules for Activities (End User).

CAUTION:  Keep manual changes to a minimum because the Optimizer works on the principles of constraint propagation and domain reduction. These principles are critical to solving complex schedules quickly. No activity that violates a hard constraint, including implicit constraints such as using the employee work schedules or excluding double-booking, can load into the memory cache. Therefore, the Optimizer might reject a manual change when it loads the activity. Even if the activity loads successfully, the Optimizer might later change the schedule for the activity.

Reloading the ABS cache daily accomplishes the following tasks:

• Old activities are released from the cache.
• Manual activity changes are loaded to the cache.
• Days in the future are available for booking. Any existing appointments are loaded into these days.

To load employee and activity data for the service regions and reload the ABS and Optimizer caches, perform the following procedures:

• Loading Employee Data for Service Regions
• Loading Activity Data for Service Regions
• Moving Activities Between Service Regions
• Reloading Data for Service Regions to the Appointment Booking System Cache
• Overriding the Data Row Limit
• Coalescing the Appointment Booking System
• Reloading Data for Service Regions to the Optimizer Cache
• Creating Workflows to Reload Data for Service Regions to the Appointment Booking System Cache

This task is a step in Process of Administering Schedules Using Siebel Scheduler.

Guidelines for Reloading Data for Service Regions

This topic provides guidelines for reloading service region data. For more information, see About Loading and Reloading Data for Service Regions.

Use the following guidelines when reloading service region data:

• Reload the caches daily, preferably after hours.

  The ABS - Days to End parameter controls the length of time in the ABS horizon. If this parameter is 14, and you do not reload the caches for 3 days, then you can book appointments for only 11 of the 14 days.

• Reload the ABS before the Optimizer, so that there are no conflicts in scheduling between the ABS and the Optimizer.
• Complete both reloads in the same day.