Many capacitated flow network papers treat reliability as a time-invariant property. However, network components degrade over time suggesting that methods to quantify the time-varying reliability of a network are appropriate. This paper proposes a method to compute the reliability of a multistate capacitated flow network in terms of multistate components characterized by a life distribution. The approach enables the calculation of the probability that demand can be satisfied over period of time despite component degradation. Examples are provided to clarify the steps required and to illustrate the assessments enabled. Based on the classical reliability theory, the Weibull reliability function is employed to characterize the degradation of network components. However, the approach is general and other distributions are also possible. The results indicate that the approach can assist a network supervisor determine reasonable demand rate and time constraint to satisfy demand as well as reason about alternative reliability improvement strategies.

中文翻译：

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整合经典可靠性和网络可靠性的方法：时变网络可靠性评估

许多容量流网络论文将可靠性视为时间不变的属性。然而，网络组件会随着时间的推移而退化，这表明量化网络随时间变化的可靠性的方法是合适的。本文提出了一种根据以寿命分布为特征的多状态组件来计算多状态电容流网络可靠性的方法。该方法可以计算尽管组件退化，但仍可以在一段时间内满足需求的概率。提供示例以阐明所需的步骤并说明启用的评估。基于经典可靠性理论，采用 Weibull 可靠性函数来表征网络组件的退化。然而，该方法是通用的并且其他分布也是可能的。