DMO: April 2008 Archives

From the ai.implant blog, how DMOC uses commercial software to generate scenarios and constructive entities for the annual Virtual Flag distributed simulation exercise:

The Distributed Missions Operations Centre of the US Air Force entrusts Presagis' STAGE Scenario to create thousands of entities for its large-scale training events.

The Distributed Missions Operations Center (DMOC) of the United States Air Force is one of the largest simulation facilities in the world. As part of the US Defense Secretary's Training Transformation Initiative, DMOC's mission is to develop and support tactical-level synthetic battlespace events for Air Force, joint, and coalition units. ...

In 2001, DMOC began using Presagis' STAGE Scenario as its blue-air environment generator. According to de Anda, "STAGE Scenario is used primarily for three functions. First, it is used to put constructive blue-air entities that can be driven by White Force operators into the event. Second, it supplements the air picture as seen from the cockpits. And, third, it increases our capabilities to realize effective communication and other training objectives."

One of the key reasons that DMOC chose to use STAGE Scenario is because of its intuitive User Interface. Explains de Anda, "Our White Force personnel change out every VF, so we need an intuitive UI that lets us get straight to flying the constructive simulations. STAGE Scenario provides this capability as our White Force drivers pick up on the interface in short order."

Additionally, DMOC needed a powerful solution since typical VF events require the generation of thousands of blue-air entities. STAGE Scenario was more than up for this challenge. Says de Anda, "STAGE Scenario can handle on the order of 10,000 entities. This is the going requirement to support VF-size events. In fact, during VF testing and integration, STAGE Scenario showed no discernable fidelity degradation when tested against 9,000 blue-air entities."...

In such large-scale event simulations, there are significant opportunities for commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) tools. However, as de Anda explains, "COTS vendors will have to remain competitive on price, incorporate open standards, such as those implemented by SISO, and work with government intelligence communities to deliver systems that work with predefined formats."

Because of its interoperability, DMOC has already committed to maintaining STAGE Scenario as an integral part of its VF event development. To this end, DMOC has purchased the rights to the STAGE Scenario code in order to be able to modify it for their own use. And, as they move forward, DMOC will continue to roll their in-house modifications into the next baseline version of STAGE Scenario.

This blog entry also has more information about how a Virtual Flag is conducted.

Presagis also produces the VAPS prototyping tool.