| Abstrakt: |
While the flexibility of a process control system may be enhanced by modular design, the effectiveness of the system often depends upon coordination of the modules’ actions. The conflict between designing clearly bounded modules and providing for coupling between them gives rise to important design tradeoffs in two major areas: the appropriate size and scope of modules for the application, and the amount of knowledge any one module must have about any other module for communication and coordination. This paper discusses a general approach to coordination and communication between modules with specific examples concerning how interdependent control functions may activate and deactivate each other. In addition, the paper describes methods for on-line reconfiguration of the relationships between modules. |
