High Level Architecture Module

What is it?

The High Level Architecture (HLA) was developed under the leadership of the United States Defense Modeling and Simulation Office (DMSO) to support interoperability between different types of simulations. HLA supports interoperability by specifying a set of standards that govern the exchange of information between simulations as they execute their respective scenarios. Any number of simulations, executing concurrently and exchanging data in accordance with HLA standards, are referred to as an HLA federation. The FLAMES HLA module allows simulations developed using FLAMES to execute in HLA federations.

How does it work?

In FORGE, the HLA module allows additional information that specifies how FIRE will interact with the HLA-compliant Runtime Infrastructure (RTI). In FIRE, the HLA module allows FIRE to exchange data with other HLA-compatible simulations and to interpret the data received from other simulations.

In HLA, information is exchanged among simulations (or federates) within a federation using instances of the object and interaction classes defined in a Federation Object Model (FOM). A definition of the particular object and interaction classes supported by a given simulation make up the Simulation Object Model (SOM).

The FLAMES HLA module is completely independent of any particular SOM. All SOM-specific processing occurs in special software objects that are developed separately and plugged into a FLAMES based application. This allows applications to be modified quickly and easily to support any SOM.

A scenario executed in an HLA federation must also include input data relating to the specific SOM being used. This data specifies how object and interaction data is handled within FIRE. What this data is and how it is entered is entirely SOM-specific.