A rapidly reconfigurable, application layer, virtual environment network protocol

Abstract

The current Distributed Interactive Simulations (DIS) Protocol has a limited ability to support real time, simulated engagements of more than 1000 entities because of its excessive use of network resources. It also lacks the extensibility to add new protocol data units to support new simulation requirements. To solve these problems it is necessary to design an implement a rapidly reconfigurable network protocol that can be easily changed and distributed to all entities in a large scale simulation. This protocol must be highly flexible and allow for the optimization of data content during execution. The approach used was to design and build a rapidly reconfigurable network protocol and the tools necessary to use it. This was accomplished in four phases. First, a protocol using the concepts of Self-defined Messages with Multiple Presentations was developed. Second, a formal grammar to describe the protocol was designed. Third, an existing protocol development tool, the DIS protocol Support Utility, was modified to use the new protocol and grammar. Fourth, the protocol was tested to determine its effect on network resource utilization. As a result of this effort, a network protocol for distributed simulations that can be optimized at run-time and easily modified has been developed. Testing shows that the protocol can reduce the network bandwidth necessary for a large-scale distributed simulation by up to 70%.