CRISIS, WHAT CRISIS – DOES REPRODUCIBILITY IN MODELING & SIMULATION REALLY MATTER?

How important it is to our discipline that we can reproduce the results of Modeling & Simulation (M&S) research? How important is it to be able to (re)use the models, data, and methods described in simulation publications to reproduce published results? Is it really that important or are the lessons and experiences described in a paper enough for us to build on the work of others? At the 2016 Winter Simulation Conference, a panel considered opinions on reproducibility in discrete-event simulation. This article builds on these and asks if there really is a reproducibility crisis in M&S? A diverse range of views on the subject are presented including reflections on the reproducibility in terms of the art and science of simulation, the frustrations of poor reproducibility, perspectives from the industrial production & logistics community, the wider context of open science and artefact sharing, and the role of provenance beyond reproducibility.