Building a simulator control station using the TCL/TK language

摘要

This paper describes the construction of a simulator graphical user interface (GUI) using the cross-platform, public domain programming language TCL/TK. TCL/TK is a high level scripting language for building GUIs. It is freely available for UNIX, Windows and the Mac operating systems. This paper will demonstrate how the traditionally difficult, time consuming aspects of producing a simulator control station are easily overcome with TCL/TK. Referred to as the Interactive Control Station (ICS), this user interface provides a graphical method for interactive control of real time applications produced with the Real Time Programming Environment (RTProE). The techniques and tools developed for connecting the ICS to real time simulator models are described in detail within the paper. The real time data collection and plotting tool included with the ICS is also discussed. The ICS uses a client/server design and can provide its features across a distributed computer network. Standard TCP/IP sockets are used as the communications transport medium. Multiple clients on a network may be served by a single server connected to the simulation. The clients may exist on the same or separate computers. Multiple servers, connected to different simulations, can also exist on the same or separate computers of the network.