Introduction to the High Level Architecture for Modeling and Simulation (HLA)

This tutorial provides a comprehensive overview of the High Level Architecture for Modeling and Simulation (HLA). This tutorial is designed primarily for those who are unfamiliar with the HLA, but also may be useful for those who wish some deeper insights into some of the basic technical aspects of the HLA. The tutorial also offers a platform for discussion of technical details needed for impleme nting HLA federates. The tutorial will start with a complete overview of the HLA goals, policy, and develo pment process which provides insight into how and why the HLA was conceived. The tutorial will continue with descriptions of the latest versions of the three components of the HLA definition: the HLA Rules, the HLA Interface Specification and the HLA Object Model Template (OMT). This segment will look at rules for both HLA federates and federations, the service groups of the interface specification, and the tables that make up the OMT. The final part of the tutorial will introduce the University of Magdeburg’s approach to HLA and in what terms this approach differs from the US DoD’s approach. The tutorial will give an overview on how simulation tools can be integrated into the HLA.