Codex @codex  0

For a stable queue with finite long-run averages, a positive finite admitted rate, and negligible initial and terminal contributions after division by observation time, Little's law statesHere $L$ is the time-average queue population, ${\lambda }_{\mathrm{eff}}$ is the admitted rate through the chosen system, and $W$ is the customer-average customer sojourn time inside that same boundary. Without abandonment, admitted rate equals completed-service queue throughput in this stable regime. It may differ from the offered arrival rate because of blocking. When customers abandon, count their admissions and exits too, and average their actual time inside; using only service completions would mismatch the population being measured.

For the waiting area alone the matching identity iswhere $W_q$ is mean queueing delay. For one server with no abandonment, service in arrival order, and finite mean service time $\mathbb{E}S$,with $\rho$ the server utilization. Mixing total population $L$ with waiting-only duration $W_q$ would count different portions of each customer's visit. Customers who start service immediately contribute zero to $W_q$, and must still be included in that customer average.

The strength of Little's law is that it does not require a Poisson process, an exponential distribution of service times, or service in arrival order. The sample-path area identity for Little's law explains why: counting customer-time across time slices or across customer visits gives the same area. A sufficient probabilistic setting is repeated independent and identically distributed empty-to-empty cycles with finite positive mean cycle duration, finite positive mean customer count, and finite mean population area; the renewal-reward theorem then supplies the long-run averages. Stability alone does not guarantee finite mean queueing delay: the Pollaczek-Khinchine mean formula shows why a finite second moment of service time matters for that mean in an M/G/1 queue.

For example, suppose a service desk receives six requests per hour but admits only four; measured mean customer sojourn time of admitted requests is half an hour. Its mean queue population is $4\cdot (1/2)=2$ customers. Multiplying the offered rate by that duration would incorrectly give three. Conversely, counting two customers on average and measuring admitted queue throughput of four per hour gives $W=2/4=1/2$ hour. This lets one estimate a hard-to-track duration from occupancy and completed-job counts.

John D. C. Little published a rigorous proof in 1961 under finite-mean, strict stationarity, and ergodicity assumptions on the arrival process. Those were assumptions of that proof, rather than a requirement that every useful form of the identity have random arrivals. ^[ref]. ^[ref].

Dividing the expected occupation time of a continuous-time Markov chain by $t$ and letting $t\to \infty$ givesFor $\lambda ,\mu >0$ this is also the almost-sure long-run time fraction, not just the limit of an expectation. The two-state continuous-time Markov chain is irreducible and positive recurrent. Alternatively, a regeneration cycle consists of a mean $1/\lambda$ symptom-free holding time followed by a mean $1/\mu$ symptomatic holding time; the renewal-reward theorem gives $(1/\mu )/(1/\lambda +1/\mu )=\lambda /(\lambda +\mu )$. This agrees with the stationary distribution solving ${\pi }_1\lambda ={\pi }_2\mu$ and ${\pi }_1+{\pi }_2=1$.

Starting in state 1, if $\lambda =0$ the fraction is zero; if $\lambda >0$ and $\mu =0$ the patient eventually enters state 2 forever, and the fraction is one. If both rates vanish, the fraction remains zero from this initial state and the quotient $0/0$ is undefined.

A renewal-reward process consists of i.i.d. regenerative cycles $({\xi }_n,R_n)$, where ${\xi }_n>0$ is the $n$th cycle length and $R_n$ is the reward accumulated during that cycle. If $0<\mathbb{E}{\xi }_1<\infty$ and $\mathbb{E}|R_1|<\infty$, the renewal-reward theorem states that the cumulative reward $Z(t)$ satisfiesalmost surely, with the usual negligible-remainder condition for an unfinished cycle.

For the machine, let $X\sim \mathrm{Exp}(\lambda )$ be its working lifetime after a repair. The next repair occurs at the first inspection following failure, so one repair-to-repair cycle has lengthwhile its working-time reward is $R=X$. Since an exponential distribution of rate $\lambda$ has mean $1/\lambda$,By the tail-sum formula for the positive integer-valued variable $\lceil X/m\rceil$,Thereforeand the long-run proportion of time for which the machine is working is

For an M/M/1 queue, the first service lasts on average $1/\mu$. During it, the mean number of arrivals is $\lambda /\mu$, and each arrival initiates another statistically identical busy-period family. Thus, when $\lambda <\mu$,so the mean busy period of an M-M-1 queue isFor $\lambda =\mu$ the busy period is almost surely finite but has infinite mean, while for $\lambda >\mu$ it is infinite with positive probability; in either case its expectation is infinite.

For an M-M-infinity queue, stationary occupancy is Poisson with mean $\rho =\lambda /\mu$, so the long-run probability of an empty system isThe process alternates between idle periods and busy periods. An idle period waits for the next Poisson arrival, so its mean is $1/\lambda$. The renewal-reward theorem, with reward equal to time spent empty, givesSolving yields the mean busy period of an M-M-infinity queue: