Week 5 Queue Lab: Test the Quick Enquiries draft for starvation

Apply the Office's draft shortest-job-first notice to a busier ticket log and check whether the longest case ever gets served.

22 March 2027

Last week you proposed your own alternative to FCFS. This week you test the Office’s actual draft — Quick Enquiries first — against a log designed to make its weakness visible.

Before the lab#

Have your week 4 proposed rule to hand; you’ll compare it against this week’s policy at the end of the lab.

In the lab#

Office of Everything file — synthetic case material. Extended ticket log: the same 20-minute dispute arrives first, then a new “collect a form” ticket (2 minutes) arrives every 3 minutes for the next hour, without stopping.

Work through the Quick Enquiries draft by hand: at every decision point, the counter serves the shortest waiting request. Track whether the 20-minute dispute is ever served, or whether the constant stream of 2-minute arrivals keeps it waiting indefinitely. This is starvation, and it is not a rare edge case here — it is what the policy does whenever short requests keep coming.

Compare this outcome to what plain FCFS would have done with the same log (the dispute is served immediately, then every form-collector waits behind it in turn). Write one sentence on who the draft policy benefits and one on who it leaves worse off, and check both against your own week 4 rule: does your rule have the same starvation problem, a different one, or none?

Afterwards#

You have now tested two alternatives to FCFS against the same case. Week 6 introduces a third — a priority rule rather than a size rule — and asks you to compare all three side by side, which is the direct rehearsal for the Policy Trial.