Distributed simulation with COTS simulation packages

Connecting COTS (commercial-off-the-self) simulation packages entails various difficulties. First of all, commercially available simulation packages hide the access to some internal data that is needed to connect to other simulation models in the distributed simulation study. Next, the data sharing between simulation models is complicated. In order to carry out distributed simulation studies applying COTS simulation packages, we have to exactly define the interfacing and data transfer mechanisms. In this paper we present a theoretical description of different solutions for interfacing and transferring data between various simulation models. These mechanisms have been implemented and tested, and applied in a project in order to prove their practical usage.