Volume 10: OGC CDB Implementation Guidance, Version 1.1.

Abstract

This document provides detailed implementation guidance for developing and maintaining a CDB compliant data store. The CDB standard defines a standardized model and structure for a single, versionable, virtual representation of the earth. A CDB structured data store provides for a geospatial content and model definition repository that is plug-and-play interoperable between database authoring workstations. Moreover, a CDB structured data store can be used as a common online (or runtime) repository from which various simulator client-devices can simultaneously retrieve and modify, in real-time, relevant information to perform their respective runtime simulation tasks. In this case, a CDB is plug-and-play interoperable between CDB-compliant simulators. A CDB can be readily used by existing simulation client-devices (legacy Image Generators, Radar simulator, Computer Generated Forces, etc.) through a data publishing process that is performed on-demand in real-time. The application of CDB to future simulation architectures will significantly reduce runtime-source level and algorithmic correlation errors, while reducing development, update and configuration management timelines. With the addition of the High Level Architecture - -Federation Object Model (HLA/FOM)1 and DIS protocols, the application of the CDB standard provides a Common Environment to which inter-connected simulators share a common view of the simulated environment. The CDB standard defines an open format for the storage, access and modification of a synthetic environment database. A synthetic environment is a computer simulation that represents activities at a high level of realism, from simulation of theaters of war to factories and manufacturing processes. These environments may be created within a single computer or a vast distributed network connected by local and wide area networks and augmented by super-realistic special effects and accurate behavioral models. SE allows visualization of and immersion into the environment being simulated2. This standard defines the organization and storage structure of a worldwide synthetic representation of the earth as well as the conventions necessary to support all of the subsystems of a full-mission simulator. The standard makes use of several commercial and simulation data formats endorsed by leaders of the database tools industry. A series of associated OGC Best Practice documents define rules and guidelines for data representation of real world features. The CDB synthetic environment is a representation of the natural environment including external features such as man-made structures and systems. A CDB data store can include terrain relief, terrain imagery, three-dimensional (3D) models of natural and manmade cultural features, 3D models of dynamic vehicles, the ocean surface, and the ocean bottom, including features (both natural and man-made) on the ocean floor. In addition, the data store can includes the specific attributes of the synthetic environment data as well as their relationships.The associated CDB Standard Best Practice documents provide a description of a data schema for Synthetic Environmental information (i.e., it merely describes data) for use in simulation. The CDB Standard provides a rigorous definition of the semantic meaning for each dataset, each attribute and establishes the structure/organization of that data as a schema comprised of a folder hierarchy and files with internal (industry-standard) formats. A CDB conformant data store contains datasets organized in layers, tiles and levels-ofdetail. Together, these datasets represent the features of a synthetic environment for the purposes of distributed simulation applications. The organization of the synthetic environmental data in a CDB compliant data store is specifically tailored for real-time applications.