JDMS Automated Link-16 Testing Using the Discrete Event System Specification and Extensible Markup Language

With the modernization of Department of Defense (DoD) systems and the growing complexity of communication equipment, traditional test methods and processes have to evolve in order to maintain their effectiveness. DoD acquisition policy requires the use of modeling and simulation (M&S) in all phases of system development life-cycles in order to ensure technical certification and mission effectiveness. The complexity of these systems poses significant challenges over traditional interoperability test methodologies. The Automated Test Case Generator (ATC-Gen), funded by the Joint Interoperability Test Command (JITC), captures a Military Standard (MIL-STD) 6016C document and translates it into rules. These are in turn formalized into test cases using the Discrete Event System Specification (DEVS). In this paper, we present a new methodology to generate the test models and perform conformance testing using system theory, the DEVS M&S framework, the System Entity Structure (SES), and Extensible Markup Language (XML). This new methodology promotes the separation of the models, the simulator, and the distributed simulation. These separations distinguish and promote reusability by developing models, the simulator, and distributed simulation independently. The DEVS test models are generated from the test cases by the Test Model Generator using the system specifications. These models are written in an XML-SES format; the resulting C++ DEVS source code is generated based on the test model XML file. The Test Driver (TD) was designed based on the Model/Simulator/View/Control (MSVC) design pattern and developed to execut