Modeling and Simulation (M&S) has proven to be an effective tool for training the warfighter and for planning and preparing against emerging threats within the global community. Key enablers that have contributed to this effectiveness have been the availability of models, tools, and other resources such as terrain databases, network assets, and scenario missions. And, as long as you remain within the mission area (i.e., Army, Navy) and domain (i.e., Surface, Air, Land) of your applied M&S framework (i.e., HLA, DIS, OOS), relative flexibility is achievable. The difficulty is in being able to leverage models across the environments, domains, and M&S frameworks to define and support scenarios and the executable environments representative of Joint training exercises. Models are almost exclusively defined for a particular simulation application. Fortunately, a standards-based approach, termed Base Object Models (BOMs), for describing and sharing models across environments, domains, and M&S frameworks has emerged from a simulation-community-wide grass-roots effort.
Essentially, BOMs can be used to represent the approaches and scenario elements that are necessary to fulfill specific military tasks, such as resupplying friendly forces or identifying and disarming combatants. Thus, they are well suited for supporting Joint training efforts. Furthermore, they serve not as executable models, but common descriptions of behavior, that can be implemented in multiple environments and frameworks.
This example-focused paper will largely center on building and using BOMs for composing Joint training environments. It will walk through the BOM development effort based on the Federation Development and Execution Process (FEDEP), and show how the Real-Time Platform Reference (RPR) BOMs and other supporting BOMs can be integrated and used to fulfill a specific training exercise. Additionally, this paper examines the language-neutral interface provided by the BOM and various implementation aspects that can be supported to enable federates.