By adding, removing, or modifying objects such as sites, servers, user profiles, and network connections, you can use the Capacity Planner Model Editor to refine and validate a capacity model that you've already created. Capacity Planner only models required infrastructure that impacts performance. Therefore, objects such as firewalls are not modeled by Capacity Planner or included in the Model Editor. The Model Editor enables you to export information generated by Capacity Planner to Microsoft Excel and Microsoft Visio.

Note
To export to Excel, you must have already run a simulation. Information included in an exported file consists primarily of simulation results data.

The Model Editor provides two primary views of your model: the Global Topology view and the Site Topology view. In various views, you can edit sites, groups of users, networks, and servers and their relationship to one another. At any time, you can zoom in or out of a given view. You can also view topologies using different routing display selections with the Routing list on the toolbar. Routing views simply display objects in different formats.

The Model Editor also provides the Model Summary view, which lists the topology, application roles, number of users or agent-managed computers in a site, servers, and hardware used by a server in your capacity model. You can copy the list the clipboard to use outside Capacity Planner.

Navigation in the Model Editor

You can navigate in the Model Editor between the Global Topology and Site Topology views in a number of ways. For example, you can use the navigation pane to drill into and out of sites, depending on the site that you select. You can also right-click in either view to display context-sensitive navigation options.

Based on your current view and which objects are selected, different tasks are available in the Current View Actions pane. Actions in this pane apply only to the objects selected.

Regardless of the view you are in or the objects selected, the same tasks in the General Actions pane are available.

Note
When you start a Model Editor task by opening an action dialog, all actions in the Current View Actions and General Actions panes are unavailable until the action dialog is closed.

You can expand and collapse sites by using the Expand nodes and Collapse nodes icons on the toolbar. These icons resemble plus and minus symbols. Expanding a site provides a detailed view of the resources in the site.

Clicking objects in either view results in different tasks appearing in the Current View Actions pane. By pressing the CTRL key as you click, you can select multiple objects. When you select multiple objects, group selection tasks appear in the Current View Actions pane.

File Menu Items and Toolbar Buttons in the Model Editor

File menu items enable you to open, save, and export your capacity model. You can also navigate to other Capacity Planner features, open Help, check for product updates, and view feedback options from the File menu.

Most toolbar buttons are standard buttons that appear in other Windows applications; however, Capacity Planner has some that are unique, as described in the following table.

Toolbar Button Description

Expand nodes

While in the Global Topology view, shows servers, client profiles, and networks in the current view. In the Site Topology view, shows CPUs, disk configurations, and connection types.

Collapse nodes

Removes object details from the current view.

Zoom in diagram

Increases the size of objects in the Model Editor.

Zoom out diagram

Decreases the size of objects in the Model Editor.

Refresh

Refreshes the view according to routing and node placement selections.

Routing list

Displays differing connections to objects in the Model Editor.

Node placement list

Arranges objects in the Model Editor according in the direction item you select.

Object selection list

Lists objects in the current view. When you click a list item, the object is selected in the current view, displaying a green rectangle around the object.

See Also