The integration of external tools into the broader context of a simulation environment requires coupling on the data level, i.e., the exchange and conversion of tool input and output data between syntactically and possibly semantically different data representations, and on the control level, i.e., parameter passing, input deck generation, tool invocation, and handling of diagnostic messages. Furthermore, on the presentation level a user interface has to be provided to allow editing of tool settings in an error-proof and intuitive way, supporting both graphical as well as text-terminal operations.
Tool integration in this context deals with
executable simulators that themselves remain unchanged by the
integration process. In contrast to this approach, other methodologies
have been devised to integrate tools by linking numerical modules
that perform the solution of the physical equations with generic
server modules that manage the data produced. For an example of this
strategy, see Sahul et al. [SWH
96].