DEMO

XNsim - Distributed Simulation Via an eXtensible Network

Nazareth Bedrossian

Aerospace Systems Group

The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, Texas, USA

Abstract

XNsim is a platform independent middleware product which provides a dynamically scalable peer-to-peer architecture for transparent access and coordination of distributed simulation models. It provides the user with a single entry point and global application execution control and a general publish-subscribe model sharing framework. Sharing of simulation component input/output behavior can be accomplished over networks ranging from small LANs to the entire Internet. The technology enables a GUI based, plug-and-play method to design arbitrary topology simulations from the shared components. The shared components are published in a model directory or library, which lists available models and their descriptions to the network subscribers. A remote user can initiate model execution as well as modify model parameters. It also allows multiple simultaneous reuse of models as well as a decentralized synchronization methodology. With XNsim software, a complete simulation can be assembled from shared, via XN Share, component subsystems written in different formats, that run on different computing platforms, with different sampling rates, in different geographic locations, and over single/multiple networks. The subsystems interact with each other via the XN Server. The simulation topology can be dynamically modified via the XN Designer. The demonstrator will provide an overview of XNsim features. More information on XNsim is available at http://www.jsc.draper.com/xn.

Presenter

Nazareth Bedrossian

Group Leader, Aerospace Systems Group

The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, Texas, USA

Short Bio

Nazareth Bedrossian is Group Leader for the Aerospace Systems Group at The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory and an Adjunct Associate Professor of Mechanical and Materials Engineering at Rice University. He also directs the International Space Station (ISS) control system flight verification task, and the Space Launch Initiative (SLI) Advanced Guidance and Control task. He represents NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) as technical point of contact for ISS Russian attitude control systems and serves on the steering committee for the NASA Aerospace Technology Working Group. From 1998-2002, Dr. Bedrossian led the development of the eSim and XNsim software products. eSim Web-enables distributed analysis and simulation, while XNsim Web-enables extensible network based distributed simulation. A general-purpose simulation server, eSim, an interactive “human-in-the-loop” simulation server eSimI, and a distributed simulation server eSimDSN were developed. The eSim and eSimI software were selected, respectively, for the 1999 and 2000 NASA Technology Expos at JSC. From 1997-1999 he was Associate Director of the Instrument Society of America Robotics Division. In 1999, he organized and chaired the AIAA/NASA/ISA Workshop on Robotics MEMS. He has 15 years experience in simulation development, analysis and design of aerospace control systems. He received a BS from the University of Florida, and SM and PhD degrees from MIT, all in Mechanical Engineering.