Sixuan Wang

Devs-based building information modeling and simulation for emergency evacuation

Nowadays, numerous Computer-aided Design (CAD) software packages support Building Information Modeling (BIM). BIM software can benefit of advanced simulation in the pre-design phase of construction projects. In this case, we show focus on models of the emergency evacuation regarding the security and safety. We analyze the evacuation simulation of a model based on DEVS (Discrete Event systems Specification) for BIM authoring tools. The idea is to automate to extraction of building information that can be subsequently used in a simulation. Our case study uses a Cell-DEVS model of the evacuation of a multi-floor building. We also show how to obtain a 3D visualization by transforming the simulation results, facilitating the work of architects, contractors and fabricators. This kind of application could be used to analyze bottlenecks and the maximum occupation for determining an optical evacuation plan.

A simulation as a service methodology with application for crowd modeling, simulation and visualization

Crowd modeling and simulation (M&S) has been used to support the analysis of the behavior of crowds, in order to predict the impact of pedestrian movement and to test design alternatives. In recent years, crowd M&S has become more complex, and new technologies such as CAD (computer-aided design) and BIM (building information modeling) authoring tools are being used to support the process. There are challenges in adopting these technologies due to the lack of automation and integration of these tools for crowd M&S. We propose a method based on a distributed architecture with simulation in the cloud, and composition using workflows. In particular, we adopt a model-driven engineering approach to extract data from CAD/BIM authoring tools, Cell-DEVS theory for crowd modeling, simulation as a service to execute simulation remotely, and three-dimensional visualization. Finally, we present a case study for crowd evacuation, discussing the advantages of the proposed architecture. We show the advantages obtained when using distributed deployment, simulation-based design and collaborative development and we discuss how this facilitates the crowd behavior study and improves reusability in crowd M&S.

A Mashup Architecture with Modeling and Simulation as a Service

Web services have been used in Modeling and Simulation M&S for many years, but it is still hard to develop complex M&S applications by using heterogeneous data and varied services. Here we show how to simplify the M&S application development by using mashup technologies. We introduce a novel architecture, the Mashup Architecture with Modeling and Simulation as a Service MAMSaaS, in order to deploy varied mashup components e.g. Modeling and Simulation as a Service, existing Web APIs, widgets and operators and to create M&S mashups for quick application development. We present various tools built to support the architecture and a case study using the mashup architecture.

MAMS: Mashup architecture with modeling and simulation as a service

Abstract The Modeling and Simulation (M&S) community has used Web service (WS) technologies to help with the increasing complexity of the applications. Although there are many Web APIs that could be useful for M&S applications, they are rarely used. One of the main reasons is that using M&S related WSs and open APIs makes it difficult to consider their integration for building complex M&S applications. Here we show how to simplify the development and integration process of such M&S applications by using a new architecture for web services Mashups, namely the Mashup Architecture for Modeling and Simulation (MAMS). MAMS is the first environment and architecture to integrate mashups and distributed simulation. MAMS provides means for a lightweight life cycle to develop, deploy, identify, select, integrate and execute varied M&S resources as services in the Cloud. We present different case studies showing the utility of the proposed architecture.

Modeling and simulation of crowd using cellular discrete event systems theory

In this paper, we discuss how Cellular Discrete Event System Specification (Cell-DEVS) theory can be used in modeling and simulation of the crowd. We will show that the efficient cell update mechanism of Cell-DEVS allows for more efficient entity-based simulation of the crowd compared to cellular automata. On the other hand the formal interfacing mechanisms provided by this theory allows for integration of other components such as DEVS atomic processing component or visualization and building information modeling components with the Cell-DEVS model. Finally, we describe in details of the design and development of several pedestrian models and present the results.

Modeling and simulation as a service architecture for deploying resources in the Cloud

In recent years, Cloud Computing has become popular to facilitate the use of Modeling and Simulation (M&S) resources. Nevertheless, there are still various issues to solve, including the structure constrain of chosen web service frameworks, the sharing of varied resources in the Cloud, and the difficulties in reproducing experiments. We show a new architecture based on Cloud Computing and new modeling methods to deal with these issues. This layered architecture, called Cloud Architecture for Modeling and Simulation as a Service (CAMSaaS), simplifies the deployment of M&S resources as services in the Cloud. CAMSaaS supports hierarchical resource services, experimental frameworks, scalable infrastructure and makes everything as a service. We deploy varied M&S resources as services in the Cloud, and build a Modeling and Simulation as a Service (MSaaS) middleware called CloudRISE to manage a variety of M&S resources. We also use the experimental framework concept to simplify the management of experiment environments. We present a case study for crowd evacuation application using the architecture.