A Concept for Credibility Assessment of Aircraft System Simulators

An efficient methodology for verification, validation, and credibility assessment of simulation models and simulator applications is an enabler for the aeronautical industry’s increasing reliance on modeling and simulation in system design and verification and on training. As a complement to traditional document-centric approaches, this paper presents a method for credibility assessment of simulator applications, in which credibility information is presented to end users directly during simulation. The central idea is that each model in a simulator is extended with a metamodel describing different aspects of credibility. The metamodel includes a number of static credibility measures and a dynamic measure that may vary during simulation. The concept is implemented and tested in two system simulators for the Saab Gripen fighter aircraft. According to the evaluation, the concept facilitates an intuitive overview of model dependencies, as well as credibility information for individual models and for a simulat...