S-167-V2-EN
The Break Rule Designer is a highly customizable tool for building break rules in your operation. It works together with Duty Breaks and can serve as the alternative for the Breaks Preference.
The Break Rule Designer is a part of the family of preference designers across Optibus, aiming to make preference setup quicker, easier, and more flexible.
How to configure the Break Rule Designer
Open Preferences
.In the Drivers section, or by using the search bar, find Break Rule Designer.
Hover over +Break rule designer and click +New Break rule designer.
Structure
Like the original Preference Designer, the Break Designer rules also consist of Context, Property, and Value.
Based on your choice in each field, additional configurations may appear, such as context filters or value ranges.
Context allows you to select required breaks and how they are arranged in the duty. Breaks must first be set up in the Duty Breaks preference.
Property lets you define the placement, number, and duration of the breaks within the duty. For break groups, Property also determines the conditions and how the rules are applied.
Value is largely tied to the selected Property. For example, if your property is Count per duty, the Value will be the number or range of break appearances within the duty.
Penalty defines whether the break rule is mandatory or can be ignored, and at what cost.
Refer to the examples below to explore break rule structure and the capabilities of the designer.
Examples
Recurring breaks
Goal: recurring long breaks every 4 hours and 30 minutes of work time.
Solution:
Define a long break in the Duty Breaks preference.
Set up the following rule in the designer:
Context: Break
Break IDs: Long break
Property: Work stretch time
Time definition: Work time
Value: Range
Range: 00:00 - 04:30
Penalty: Restrict
Recurring break grouping
Goal: Recurring breaks every 4:30 or every 5:00 if the stretch starts with a specific route.
Solution:
First, define a meal break in the Duty Breaks preference.
Then, create two break rules in the designer and make them interchangeable:
Recurring break every 4:30:
Context: Break
Break IDs: Meal
Property: Work stretch time
Time definition: Work time
Value: Range
Range: 00:00 - 4:30
Penalty: Restrict
Recurring break every 5:00 of working time if the driving time of each work stretch doesn’t exceed 4 hours:
Context: Required break
Break IDs: Meal
Filter: Routes (work stretch) - select the relevant routes
Property: Work stretch time
Time definition: Work time
Value: Range
Range: 00:00 - 5:00
Penalty: Restrict
Group the two breaks:
Context: Break rule group
Rules: [the two rules created above]
Property: Condition
Value: Satisfy either (per break stretch)
Penalty: Restrict
Pattern breaks
Goal: Each driver should have a rest break of at least 15 minutes and a meal break.
Solution:
Define a meal break in Duty Breaks like in two previous examples.
Define a rest break in Duty Breaks with the time range 00:15 - 00:40.
With the designer, create the following rule:
Context: Pattern break
Break Pattern IDs: Rest, Meal (the meal break you defined in Duty Breaks, repeated twice)
Break order is fixed: True (this defines whether the order of the breaks is important)
Property: Count per duty
Value: Range
Range: 1-1
Penalty: Restrict
Accumulated break
Goal: For every 4.5 hours of work time drivers should get at least 1 hour of accumulated break time. The accumulated break types are Rest (minimum of 15 minutes) and Meal (minimum of 25 minutes).
Solution:
First, define Meal and Rest in Duty Breaks.
Then, define the two break rules in the designer:
Time before break (how often the accumulated break is calculated):
Context: Accumulated breaks
Break IDs: Meal, Rest
Property: Relative to start time
Time definition: Work stretch time
Value: Range
Range: —:— - 4:30 (This time resets back to 0 when the accumulated break time reaches 1 hour)
Penalty: Restrict (None)
Time before the break resets every time the conditions are met.
Accumulated break duration (how much accumulated break time is expected within the work stretches defined above):
Context: Accumulated breaks
Break IDs: Meal, Rest
Property: Duration
Value: Range
Range: 01:00 - —:—
Penalty: Restrict (None)
To make the two rules above work together, apply the third rule to combine them:
Context: Break rule group
Rules: [the two rules above]
Property: Condition
Value: Satisfy all (per break stretch)
Penalty: Restrict (None)
Accumulated break or recurring break
Goal: Every 4 hours of work time drivers should either get 1 hour of accumulated break time or 40 minutes of a straight (uncut) break.
Solution:
Define the accumulated break as in Example 4.
Define the recurring break as in Example 1.
Group the rules:
Context: Break rule group
Rules: Accumulated break, Recurring break
Property: Condition
Value: Satisfy either (per break stretch)
Penalty: Restrict (None)