Enabling Reactive Streams in HLA-based Simulations through a Model-Driven Solution

Modern systems are exposing an ever increasing degree of complexity also due to the heterogeneity of the involved components. Distributed simulation is widely recognized as an effective tool to carry out verification and validation activities for heterogeneous and complex systems. Unfortunately, the use of distributed simulation frameworks and related implementation technologies require a proper modeling and simulation know-how, as well as a significant effort and software development skills. As a result, distributed simulation is not typically addressed by systems engineers who do not have the required expertise or background. The MONADS model-driven method has been introduced to overcome such limitations and provide systems engineers with the ability to properly carry out simulation-based verification and validation activities. The method specifically addresses the HLA (High Level Architecture) distributed simulation framework and introduces an automated approach to generate a significant portion of the HLA code from system models specified in SysML, the standard modeling language in the systems engineering field. The automatically obtained code is then to be finalized by a manual programming activity. This paper contributes to make easier and further reduce the effort of such a manual activity by integrating the reactive features of the RxHLA framework into the MONADS method. This integration enables the use of streams to effectively manage HLA-based asynchronous interactions. The paper describes the technical details of the various strategies that can be used to integrate RxHLA into the MONADS method, thus providing a significant degree of flexibility to MONADS users.