Simulation Driven Virtual Reality:

A Framework for Large Scale Virtual Simulation

Lacey Duckworth – Ph.D. StudentFebruary 16, 2008

Tentative Committee:Dr. Strelzoff (Chair), Dr. Sulbaran,Dr. Seyfarth, Dr. Wang, Dr. Zhang

ObjectiveTo obtain your feedback on an

early version of my Ph.D. prospectus.

Form my Ph.D. committee

AgendaProblem

◦Background◦Preliminary Study◦Difficulty of Problem◦Applicable Experience

ObjectiveMethodologyExpected Results and Impact

ProblemA robust and reusable

communicationmethod does not exist to

connectexternal simulation languages

with thecompelling and accessible client-

serverVirtual Reality Environments.

Background

Creating Large Scale Virtual Simulations is very time consuming and the result is

not very reusable.

Preliminary Study

200 HoursCode is not

modular, extendable,or object oriented

Pascagoula example 46 major rigs

x 10 more complex than sample x 200 hours 96,000 hours

Why Is This So Difficult? 1Second LifeTM and all similar

client-server VR environments such as MultiverseTM and OpenSLTM were never intended for large-scale software development.

Ideal: An object-oriented language for "top-level" process rigs where all instances and specialized rigs could be easily derived.

Why Is This So Difficult? 2Computer Scientists are not Refinery

Plant Operators. Very hard to get the simulation correct from conversations and schematics.

Ideal: A high-level behavioral simulation environment in which programmers would contribute a first version and plant operators and consultants could iteratively "get the details right” largely on their own.

Example of “Communication”

Sketch received from consultant and

interpretation of the atmospheric

distillation process.

Why Is This So Difficult? 3Second Life was not intended for

large scale computations. With larger numbers of numerical processes, servers bog down and performance degrades.

Ideal: An external simulation language that could run independently on a dedicated server providing scalable performance as the size of the simulation grew.

Applicable Experience 1Our research group has a lot of

experience and success building communication bridges in and out of the environment SecondLifeTM.

Applicable Experience 2LabVIEW is a popular

Instrumentation simulation (USM has a license)

1 - Object Oriented – Hierarchal2 - Well known among Chemical Engineers3 - Reasonable performance – multi-core adaptive

ObjectiveStep1: Define a

communication language protocol schema between a simulation language and a client-server Virtual Reality Environment.

Step 2: Test the robustness of the developed communication protocol.

Step 3: Develop a generalized framework to provide reuse of the communication protocol.

Restating the ProblemA robust and reusable communication method does not exist to connect the external simulation languages with thecompelling and accessible client-server Virtual Reality Environments.

MethodologyStep 1: Define Communication Protocol

◦ Qualitative - Content Analysis Qualitative: describes a schema using flexible guidelines Content Analysis: identifies specific characteristics of a

body of materialStep 2: Test the Robustness

◦ Quantitative – Action Research Quantitative – trying to prove if theory is correct,

numerical data is collected and presented. Action Research – Did developing this software decrease

time?Step 3: Develop Reuse Framework

◦ Qualitative – Content Analysis Qualitative – describes a framework through written

results Content Analysis – identifies specific characteristics of a

body of material

Methodology (Cont.)Step 1: Define a

communication language protocol schema between:◦The finite state machine definition

of the generalized simulation language (Σ1,S1,s01,δ1,F1)

◦The event-driven state machine definition of the client-server virtual reality environment (Σ2,S2,s02,δ2,F2).

Methodology (Cont.)Step 2: Test the robustness of

the developed communication between the two protocols:◦Virtual Environment - SecondLifeTM

◦Simulation Environment - LabVIEWTM

◦Test Case Refinery Process or other Large Scale

Construction Project

Methodology (Cont.)Step 3: Develop a generalized

framework to provide reuse of the communication protocol◦Provide code reusability.◦Tested through a small experiment

of new methodology of reuse vs. traditional.

Expected Results and Impact (1)

A communication language

protocol schema between a

simulation language and a

client-server Virtual Reality

Environment.

Expected Results and Impact (2)Communication between

virtual reality environment SecondLifeTM and LabVIEWTM.

 

Expected Results and Impact (3)Experimentally tested

framework to provide reusable simulation driven virtual environment components

Thank you for your participation.

Questions