There are several competing sub-goals for the Symonym simulator that are carefully balanced to create the most relevant and realistic simulation from the perspective of the robot:

• Realtime or better performance.
•   Statistically based sensor and actuator I/O.
•   Identical interfaces between the real and simulated robot.
•   Optimized packaging of simulations for size and transportability.
•   Cross Platform Design throughout.
•   Highly Threaded to take advantage of multiple CPU cores.
•   Model Building from a machine readable format (XML).
•   Simulation in batch and interactive modes.

Robots sense and respond to the world through sensors and actuators.  Symonym offers the most realistic sensing and actuation allowing the robot control mechanism to be accurately be tested, trained, and refined.