Ecos: An accessible and intuitive co-simulation framework
Lars Ivar Hatledal · The Journal of Open Source Software · 2025
Ecos is a cross-platform framework for running co-simulations adhering to the Functional Mockup Interface (FMI) standard (Blochwitz et al., 2012); an open standard for model exchange and co-simulation of dynamic systems.The FMI Standard provides three interface types for difference aspects of models, namely: FMI for Model Exchange (ME), FMI for Co-simulation (CS), and FMI for Scheduled execution (Since FMI 3.0).Ecos supports the co-simulation mode, which is the most widely used interface type.An FMU (Functional Mock-up Unit) is a self-contained component that implements the FMI standard.It is packaged as a zip archive containing:• A shared library for each supported platform, which implements a standardized C interface.• A modelDescription.xml file, describing the FMU's capabilities and available variables.• Optionally, component-specific resources embedded within the archive.