Date of Award

12-1996

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Department

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

First Advisor

Martin R. Stytz, PhD

Abstract

In warfare, be it a training simulation or actual combat, a commander's time is one of the most valuable and fleeting resources of a military unit. Thus, it is natural for a unit to have a plethora of personnel to analyze and filter information to the decision-maker. This dynamic exchange of ideas between analyst and commander is currently not available within the distributed interactive simulation (DIS) community. This lack of exchange limits the usefulness of the DIS experience to the commander and his troops. This thesis addresses the commander's isolation problem through the integration of a collaborative workspace within AFIT's Synthetic BattleBridge (SBB) as a technique to improve situational awareness. The SBB's Collaborative Workspace enhances battlespace awareness through CSCW (computer supported cooperative work) enabling communication technologies. The SBB's Collaborative Workspace allows the user to interact with other SBB users through the transmission and reception of public bulletins, private email, real-time chat sessions, shared viewpoints, shared video, and shared annotations to the virtual environment. Collaborative communication between SBB occurs through the use of standard and experimental DIS-compliant protocol data units. The SBB's Collaborative Workspace gives the battlespace commander the widest range of communication options available within a DIS virtual environment today.

AFIT Designator

AFIT-GCS-ENG-96D-28

DTIC Accession Number

ADA325522

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