Glossary of Terms VII
FMS (Forces Modeling and Simulation)
- A major class of DoD (Department of Defense) applications, which are often termed "war-games". FMS either involves virtual time event driven simulations or real-time simulations involving people and military vehicles or instruments in the loop. Typically FMS uses a geographically distributed set of computers to simulate a geographically distributed application.
IMT (Integrated Modeling and Testing)
- A major class of DoD applications aimed at detailed simulation of the capabilities of military subsystems such as a new tank. IMT simulations tend to be similar to FMS but include more detail for the component being tested. IMT can involve real systems in the loop, and is of growing importance as DoD cuts back on expensive physical tests. Civilian analogues are car crash simulations used in the automobile industry and computational fluid dynamics simulations substituting for wind tunnels in the aeronautics industry.