Component systems are collections of components organized into a DtComponentSystem.

Systems are used to represent some logical subsystem of a simulation object, such as a weapon or movement capabilities. To see which systems have been defined for use in VR-Forces, use the Simulation Object Editor, or go to the ./data/simulationModelSets/<model_set>/vrfSim/systems directory to examine the system definition files (.sysdef) directly. Some example systems are presented in Model Implementations.

A DtComponentSystem contains a network (DtSimComponentNetwork) of sensors, controllers, and actuators, and (recursively) systems. Each time a component system is ticked, it ticks its sensors followed by its sensors, controllers, and actuators, in that order. Within each of these categories, elements are ticked in the order that they appear in the sysdef file. Thus the order in the data file defines an execution priority. For example, controllers that are ticked early may take control of the input data ports of components they are connected to, thus preventing other controllers from providing data to those ports. See Setting the Priority of Components.

Ports and Port Groups. Components in a system can send and receive data anonymously to other components or systems through the use of named ports.
Process State Repositories. Components can save state in a repository that is private to the component or shared by the components in a system.
Modeling Resources in a System. Each DtComponentSystem has a DtSimResourceManager that maintains any resources associated with the system.