What is SIMulation Workbench?
SIMulation Workbench (SimWB) provides a comprehensive framework for developing and executing real-time hardware-in-the-loop and man-in-the-loop simulations.
The SimWB real-time core is organized around a very fast memory resident database (RTDB). Simulation models and I/O processes have direct access to the RTDB with very low latency. Models and I/O processes run sequentially during the real-time loop with their execution dispatched by the SimWB scheduler. This modular design allows for complete I/O independence from the various models with a point-and-click GUI. It provides scalability across multiple cores as the number of simulation models and hardware I/O devices increase. SimWB leverages the powerful features of Concurrent’s RedHawk™ Linux® real-time operating system and is fully optimized for multi-channel applications.
Features
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Comprehensive Documentation
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Real-Time Linux Simulation Platform
SimWB is delivered on fully-integrated Concurrent iHawk multiprocessor platforms running the RedHawk Linux real-time operating system. iHawk systems are based on COTS components offering the latest processor, chipset, memory and I/O bus technology. Concurrent’s state-of-the-art COTS-based iHawk systems offer significantly greater performance than simulation solutions that use proprietary hardware. All I/O devices and Linux drivers required for a simulation are fully integrated and tested by Concurrent.
Support for Industry Standard Tools
SimWB supports modeling environments such as Simulink®, VI-grade, SIMPACK, AMESim, Dymola, veDYNA, MapleSim®, GTSuite and CarSim®. SimWB also supports the environment-independent FMI standard. An extensive API allows hand-written C, C++ and Fortran models to be integrated directly into SimWB and executed along with other models.
SimWB’s MLToolkit component is fully integrated with MathWorks® Simulink. Models can be easily imported from Simulink using a SimWB tool without a need for inserting hardware specific S-function blocks. Model parameters are automatically extracted from Simulink models and mapped into the RTDB allowing them to be modified at run-time. SimWB natively supports multi-rate simulation models developed using Simulink by targeting different rates to different CPU cores.
SimWB interfaces with products such as GenesisIG from Diamond Visionics™, rFpro, PreScan, FlightGear, X-Plane®, etc. SimWB provides a comprehensive API to allow customers to implement interfaces to other external environments.
Real-Time Database
The RTDB stores definitions of all data items used by the simulation such as model variables and their mapping to I/O boards and model parameters. RTDBs can be automatically created from Simulink and other modeling tools via a GUI. RTDBs provide for complete I/O independence from models. All the information necessary to configure I/O points and data bus protocols, and to read, convert, write and store simulation variables is maintained in the RTDB.
Complete GUI Control
SimWB’s platform-independent Control Center (Windows® or Linux) provides the front end to configure and manage the real-time engine. The Control Center is a network client that can run on any system connected to the SimWB real-time machine.
Simulation Playback
SimWB’s Playback tool allows recorded test runs to be replayed into the system. The user selects the recorded session and simply starts a test run in playback mode. The playback interface allows a user to forward to a specified time within a recorded session as well as stepping through its execution frame-by-frame.
Data Recorder
With the SimWB Data Recorder tool, any RTDB point can be logged in real-time. Hardware and engineering unit values as well as run-time flags and time stamps are recorded. Depending on the performance required, data recording can be run on the real-time host or on a separate networked server. Data recording can be turned on and off during simulation runs by GUI command, real-time script or user program.
Data Visualization and Plotting
SimWB provides a GUI viewer tool to display and plot RTDB items in real-time. Values are refreshed in real-time and time plots can be zoomed in, paused and configured as needed. In addition, the viewer can be used to set RTDB item values. SimWB also provides a platform-independent HMI environment to build custom displays including charts, gauges, knobs and image animation. These widgets allow an operator to interact with a running test in real-time.
Test Management via Real-Time Scripting
Swm, an easy-to-use scripting language, provides full control and visibility into SimWB test runs. Swm gives the user realtime access to simulation model data values as well as frame timing information and data recording functions. Users can directly read and modify data, test for logical conditions, trace their test execution and generate a complete HTML report of a test run. A Swm file is automatically compiled to a C executable and then run once per simulation cycle.