From Data Fusion to Situation Analysis

This paper proposes a new concept, Situation Analysis (SA), in an attempt to merge into a unifying synthesis the main notions put forward by well established data fusion and situation awareness models. In addition to clarifying the original concepts of these models, this synthesis expands on some of these ideas while achieving a fair depth in the level of details and the rigorousness of the resulting generic description. A particular care has been devoted to the selection of an appropriate unifying terminology to designate the fundamental elements of SA. The proposed model both defines the scope of the situation analysis process and establishes a comprehensive framework that could facilitate the dialogue between researchers, technologists, developers, and users of military command decision support systems.