Creating ghost elements

Large diagrams can become unwieldy, due to the long distances across which influence arrows must be drawn. To work around this, it is possible to create a ghost of a node element (a compartment or a variable), which has the same value at all times as the original. The ghost can be placed close to the other element(s) that the original element influences. A ghost can be recognised by its appearance (ghostly).

A single original element can be ghosted more than once, each ghost being placed closer to other elements. Influence arrows and flows can be drawn to and from ghosts as usual. These will affect all instances of the original. To create a ghost, the following procedure is used:

1. Click on the ghost button on the tool bar, or select the "Ghost" item on the "Tools" menu.
2. Click on the element to be ghosted.
3. Click on the model diagram to place the ghost. If you click on an existing element on the model diagram, it will become the ghost. If you click in a blank area, a new symbol will be placed there.

Once a ghost is created, changes to its value or equation, will also affect the original, and other ghosts created from the same original. Care must be taken in using ghosts as it is easy to overlook the fact that a ghost exists elsewhere and will be affected by changes made to the original which are not appropriate for the ghost.

There are implied influence arrows between the original element and its ghost. You can turn on the display of these influence arrows, in order to find all related ghosts for example, using the "Show detail… Ghost links" command of the View menu.

Note that if you delete the original element, all its ghosts will become undefined. You can delete a ghost without affecting the original, unless you have added influence arrows or flows to the ghost, in which case the original will become incomplete.

In: Contents >> Working with model diagrams