Abstract
Distributed simulation represents a solid discipline and an effective approach for handling the increasing complexity in the analysis and design of modern Systems and Systems of Systems (SoSs). The IEEE 1516-2010 – High-Level Architecture (HLA) is one of the most mature and popular standards for distributed simulation, and it is increasingly exploited in a great variety of application domains, ranging from aerospace to energy, due to its capabilities to enable the interoperability and reusability of distributed simulation components. However, the development of fully fledged simulation models, based on the IEEE 1516-2010 standard, is still a challenging task and requires considerable development effort that often results not only in an increase in development time but also in low reliability. In this context, the paper presents the HLA Development Kit framework, a general-purpose, domain-independent software framework that aims to ease the development of HLA-based simulations by letting the developers to focus on the specific aspects of their simulation rather than dealing with the common HLA functionalities. Moreover, the so obtained simulation code is independent of any specific HLA platform, thus enabling its deployment and execution on any desired implementation of the HLA standard provided it is written in Java. The effectiveness of the proposed framework is shown in the context of the Simulation Exploration Experience (SEE), a project organized by the Simulation Interoperability Standards Organization (SISO) and led by NASA that involves several U.S. and European Institutions.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Edwin Z. Crues (NASA JCS) for his precious advice and suggestions in the development of the HLA Development Kit. A special note of thanks goes also to all the NASA staff involved in the SEE Project: Priscilla Elfrey, Stephen Paglialonga, Michael Conroy, Dan Dexter, Daniel Oneil, to Björn Möller (PITCH Technologies), and to all the members of SEE teams.
Statement of contribution
The Modeling & Simulation (M&S) of modern cyber-physical systems is presenting new challenges. New M&S techniques, methods, and tools are emerging that take advantage of distributed simulation environments. One of the most mature and popular standards for distributed simulation is the IEEE 1516-2010 - High-Level Architecture (HLA) that, although originally developed for military applications, is increasingly exploited in a great variety of application domains due to its capabilities to enable the interoperability and reusability of distributed simulation components. However, the development of fully fledged simulation models, based on the IEEE 1516-2010 standard, is still a challenging task and requires considerable development effort that often results not only in an increase in development time but also in low reliability. In this context, the paper presents the HLA Development Kit Framework, a general-purpose, domain-independent software framework that aims to ease the development of HLA-based simulations by letting the developers to focus on the specific aspects of their simulation rather than dealing with the common HLA functionalities. Moreover, the so obtained simulation code is independent of any specific HLA platform, thus enabling its deployment and execution on any desired implementation of the HLA standard provided it is written in Java. The effectiveness of the proposed framework is shown in the context of the Simulation Exploration Experience (SEE), a project organized by SISO (Simulation Interoperability Standards Organization) and led by NASA that involves several U.S. and European Institutions.
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Appendix
Appendix
This appendix reports the code that has been developed for creating an HLA Federate starting from a REPAST-based agent without using the functionalities provided by the SEE-DKF.
1.1 A.1 The simulation step of the excavator agent in REPAST
1.2 A.2 The publishAndSubscribe() method of the Excavator Federate
1.3 A.3 The updateAttributeValues() method of the Exavator Federate
The code reported below updates the handle variables with the encoded Excavator’s coordinates, put them in the attributes Collection, and send them to the RTI with a timestamp.
1.4 A.4 Receiving and decoding updates by the Excavator Federate Ambassador
The following code is defined in the Excavator Federate Ambassador for receiving updates from the UAV object:
The decoder for the above received data is reported below:
1.5 A.5 The FOM module of the Excavator Federate
The snapshot of code that describes the published EXCx coordinate, which is an attribute of the Excavator class, is shown below:
1.6 A.6 DataTypes in the FOM module of the Excavator Federate
In the Excavator FOM, only an Integer data type has been defined. The snapshot of code in XML is shown below:
1.7 A.7 Time synchronization
The method below implements TAR requests and belongs to the Excavator Federate class. This method is annotated as scheduled, and therefore, it is added to the REPAST scheduler.
The method below handles TAGs and belongs to the Federate Ambassador class.
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Falcone, A., Garro, A., Taylor, S.J.E. et al. Experiences in simplifying distributed simulation: The HLA development kit framework. J Simulation 11, 208–227 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41273-016-0039-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41273-016-0039-4