An Ontology-Based Approach for Simplified FMU Variable Connections With Automatic Verification of Semantically Correct Configuratio

Simulation is increasingly used as an engineering tool in the maritime industry. Currently, there is a particular focus on digital twins, where a supplier of equipment should also supply a simulation model of the equipment. Today, the person configuring the simulator must manually connect all required signals between these models, interpreting the meaning of each signal name to determine which signal can be connected together (e.g., connecting “pressure out” to “pressure in”, while ensuring that their units match). This is a tedious and error-prone process.

In this paper, we present a method for automatically connecting variables of different models while complying with the FMI standard in co-simulations. This also includes a method for unit conversions. The methods for both automatic connections and unit conversions are based on ontologies. The key idea is to build an ontology, based on existing ontologies, which enables structuring model input and output variables into groups and hierarchies, and assign them a defined type. This enables reasoning about connections between models, and simplifies the model connections. The focus in this paper is to present the ontology, how FMI interface signals can be connected to the ontology, and how this can be used to simplify model connections.