Initialization

The NETN Initialization component provides a standard way of documenting and providing key data related to the initial states and relationships among units represented in a scenario. Preparation of a distributed CAX environment includes the distribution and initialization of common data including but not limited to Order of Battle (ORBAT), environment datasets and other initial scenario settings. The Military Scenario Definition Language (MSDL) SISO-STD-007 is the core standard used by NETN to represent ORBAT and initial scenario data.

NETN also defines the following MSDL extensions:

• Initial allocation of modelling responsibilities as additional deployment information
• Extended unit and equipment type identification based on SISO-REF-010 enumerations
• Representation of a unit's holdings of platform, equipment, human and other resources
• Extended description of humans to capture rank and category codes
• Embarkment added as new type status for a unit's support role to indicate that a unit or equipment is embarked on another unit.

The representation of Aggregate Units and Physical Object in NETN is based on the RPR-FOM representation with extensions to better reference data captured in MSDL. In particular a Universally Unique IDentifier (UUID) is added to all Aggregate and Physical Entities in the federation. The UUID use the same format as in MSDL and is used to provide a unique identifier of simulated objects to its corresponding scenario description in MSDL format. The RPR-FOM has been extended with subclasses for all platforms and the AggregateEntity object class to add the UUID attribute and additional information.

The MSDL standard is currently undergoing revision and new versions of this standard will impact how initialization data is represented in future versions of NETN FAFD. Representation of task organization, internal organizational relationships and relationships between different organizations may in some situations need to change dynamically during execution of a federation. Future versions of the NETN Initialization module will provide standards for both initialization and dynamic update of this type of information.