Containers with Internal Clocks

In some situations, you may wish to use different timesteps in different portions of your model. This is useful, for example, if the processes represented in one portion of your model occur rapidly and hence require a small timestep to model accurately, while processes represented in the rest of your model occur much more slowly, such that a larger timestep can be used.

GoldSim allows you to assign a timestep that is smaller than the “global” timestep to one or more Containers. For example, your model could have a 10 day “global” timestep, but you could assign a 1 day timestep to a specific Container in your model that represents a system that changes rapidly and hence requires a smaller timestep to simulate accurately.

You can specify smaller timesteps for a Container by assigning the Container an “internal clock”. Containers can be assigned internal clocks by selecting the Internal Clock feature in the Container dialog.

Note: When you specify a Container as having an Internal Clock, you cannot also define it as having Looping Capability (these two options are mutually exclusive).

Warning: When you assign an internal clock to a Container, the Treat as SubSystem feature is also automatically selected (and cannot be deselected unless you first turn off Internal Clock). That is, a Container with an internal clock, by definition, is treated as a SubSystem. Because a Container with an internal clock is treated as a SubSystem, this puts certain limitations on how these Containers can be used.

When you assign an internal clock to a Container, an Internal Clock tab is added to the Container dialog, and the field in this tab is used to define the manner in which GoldSim timesteps within the Container: