Integration of hypermedia capability into NPSNET IV.8, a large-scale real-time distributed simulation system

Abstract

In today's large-scale computer simulations, the need has arisen to provide the user with an informed means of navigating a virtual world, such as with hypermedia. While previous work has been conducted in the area of hypermedia in a small-scale, single-user virtual world simulation, there has been no design and implementation of hypermedia capability into a large-scale, real-time networked simulation, such as the NPSNET project. The method chosen for this thesis was to expand upon the Hyper-NPSNET project, a small-scale virtual world simulation system with hypermedia capability, to provide this capability to NPSNET. Access to video, audio, graphical, and textual data is provided via 'anchors' placed throughout the world. Additionally, a GUI interface panel was developed which allows the user to navigate throughout the virtual world, and access information stored in an associated database. The interface panel allows the user to view specific information from anchors within the 3D world. Additional utility is provided for authoring of new anchors in the world. The result of this thesis is that NPSNET now possesses a full hypermedia capability, controllable via a system interface panel. A better overall training environment is provided because users can now readily access database information while traversing this large-scale, multi-user virtual simulation.