Introduction to the discrete event system specification formalism and its application for modeling and simulating cyber-physical systems

Abstract

The Discrete Event System Specification (DEVS) formalism is a set of conventions for specifying discrete event simulation models. In this tutorial, we introduce the core concepts of DEVS. First, we introduce a set of informal requirements from which a formal specification is to be developed. Then, we present different modeling conventions at different levels of abstraction. The tutorial exploits the DEVS formalism’s support for modular model design. The concepts are discussed with an example of cyber-physical systems modeling and implementation, which can be used to understand the main concepts of the formalism.