Alternatives

Alternatives are basic entities studied in a decision problem. Depending on the problem, they can represent different objects, solutions, courses of action, etc., which are evaluated and analyzed by a DEX model.

In DEXi Suite, each alternative is represented by its:

• name (not necessarily unique),

• description: optional, possibly longer description of the alternative,

• a set of values, so that one value is assigned to each attribute in the tree of attributes.

The set of values is further partitioned into:

• alternative description: vector of values assigned to basic attributes;

• intermediate evaluation results: values assigned to aggregate attributes other than the roots of the tree;

• final (or overall) evaluation results: values assigned to the root(s) of the tree.

Values assigned to attributes are of different types, collectively referred to as DEX values.