A Refined Mean Field Approximation.

Stochastic models have been used to assess the performance of computer (and other) systems for many decades. As a direct analysis of large and complex stochastic models is often prohibitive, approximations methods to study their behavior have been devised. One very popular approximation method relies on mean field theory. Its widespread use can be explained by the relative ease involved to define and solve a mean field model in combination with its high accuracy for large systems.