SimWorx: an Ada 95 distributed simulation application framework supporting HLA and DIS

This paper describes SimWorx, a reusable object-oriented application framework for distributed simulation which is compliant with both the DoD High Level Architecture (HLA) for Modeling and Simulation and the Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) standards. SimWorx provides a bridge between legacy DIS-based applications and the HLA. A researcher can create a new simulation which is an HLA federate using SimWorx which provides a built-in scheme for simulation operation. Then, by using the SimWorx DIS Surrogate Run-Time Infrastructure (RTI) in place of the standard HLA RTI (RTI F.0), the new simulation can interoperate with legacy applications. SimWorx was implemented in Ada 95 using software engineering methods. It is a concurrent system which takes advantage of Ada's task construct to ensure time-sensitive operations like dead-reckoning can take place while minimizing impact to other parts of the system design. It consists of numerous cooperating object-oriented classes. Client developers use inheritance extension to customize the behavior of the framework.