Animated graphics and computer simulation
WSC '87 Proceedings of the 19th conference on Winter simulation
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The purpose of this paper is to describe the benefits of graphics in recent computer simulation analyses at Battelle's Northwest Laboratory and to present the graphics package developed at Battelle to perform these analyses. These graphics capabilities are part of a collection of simulation tools built over the last three years by Battelle staff to aid the development and understanding of simulation models. The system is called INTERACTIVE SIMULATION WITH GRAPHIC TOOLS (INSIGHT) and is comprised of the following elements: • Code Development Tools • Preprocessor • Graphic editors • Run-time library • Postprocessor. This discussion will focus upon the structure and capabilities of the graphics elements of INSIGHT and upon the usefulness of these graphics capabilities in recent simulation projects. The paper is divided into three segments. First, a brief description of a recent simulation project performed for the U.S. DOE is provided, including example screens of the interactive graphics developed by INSIGHT tools. The second section discusses the structure and use of INSIGHT; special emphasis upon the graphics editors is presented. These sections are followed by a summary of the work to date, including both the benefits of interactive simulation graphics to work at Battelle Northwest (BNW) and the challenges to making these tools more useful to future simulation analyses.