A Portable and Secure Package Format for Executable Simulation Modules based on WebAssembly

Abstract

We propose a new format (Digital Twin Assembly - dtasm) for self-contained executable co-simulation modules that is portable and sandboxed, yet offers performance close to native machine code and is sufficiently lightweight for running on embedded devices. Dtasm is based on WebAssembly, a standardized bytecode format for a stack-based virtual machine originally developed for high-performance computations in web browsers. A language-independent binary interface for such modules is described that is functionally comparable to FMI for co-simulation but not tied to a particular programming language. We discuss the benefits and drawbacks of this approach and how it can address some specific issues for executable simulation modules running in parallel to operation of real systems.