Methods and systems for management and control of an automation control module

• US 20040049674A1
• Filed: 09/10/2002
• Published: 03/11/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 09/10/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: GE Fanuc Automation North America Incorporated
• Original Assignee: GE Fanuc Automation North America Incorporated
• Inventors: Collier, David Scott, Bolfing, Brad J., Mercer, Ferrell Louis, Kadingo, Jason Daniel
• Granted Patent: US 7,441,114 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 713/153
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/166 at the transport layer

Abstract

An automation control module (ACM) including an ACM central processing unit (CPU) and a web system electrically connected to the ACM CPU. The web system is configured to process security layer encrypted hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests from a network.

Claims

1. An automation control module (ACM) comprising:

an ACM central processing unit (CPU); and

a web system electrically coupled to said ACM CPU, said web system configured to process security layer encrypted hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests from a network.

2. An ACM in accordance with claim 1 wherein said web system comprises a secure web server electrically coupled to said ACM CPU and the network, said secure web server configured to process security layer encrypted HTTP requests from the network.

3. An ACM in accordance with claim 1 wherein the security layer encrypted HTTP requests are encrypted using secure sockets layer (SSL).

4. An ACM in accordance with claim 2 wherein said web system further comprises a secure network interface configured to receive the security encrypted HTTP requests from the network, decrypt the security encrypted HTTP requests from the network, and transfer decrypted HTTP requests to said secure web server.

5. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said secure web server configured to respond to the decrypted HTTP requests by processing the decrypted HTTP requests and transferring the responses to said secure network interface.

6. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said secure web server comprises at least one web page file.

7. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data from said ACM CPU to said secure network interface.

8. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data to said ACM CPU.

9. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data from said ACM CPU to said secure network interface and embed said ACM data within said at least one web page file based on function tags embedded within said at least one web page file.

10. An ACM in accordance with claim 4 wherein said web server configured to send said at least one web page file to through said secure network interface to said network.

11. An ACM in accordance with claim 1 wherein said ACM comprises a backplane interface electrically connected to said ACM and a backplane electrically connected to said backplane interface, said backplane configured for connection with at least one of an input/output (I/O) module and an input module.

12. An ACM in accordance with claim 5 wherein said network interface configured to receive the responses to the decrypted HTTP requests, encrypt the responses to the decrypted HTTP requests, and send the encrypted responses to the network.

13. An automation control module (ACM) system comprising:

an ACM;

a network;

a computer electrically connected to said network and configured to communicate with said network; and

a web subsystem electrically connected to said ACM and said network, and configured to process security layer encrypted hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests from received from said computer through said network.

14. An ACM system in accordance with claim 13 wherein said web subsystem comprises a secure web server electrically connected to said ACM CPU and said network, said secure web server configured to process security layer encrypted HTTP requests received from said computer through said network.

15. An ACM system in accordance with claim 13 wherein said security layer encrypted HTTP requests are encrypted using secure sockets layer (SSL).

16. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said web subsystem further comprises a secure network interface configured to receive said security encrypted HTTP requests from said computer through said network, decrypt said security encrypted HTTP requests from said network, and transfer decrypted HTTP requests to said secure web server.

17. An ACM system in accordance with claim 16 wherein said secure web server configured to respond to the decrypted HTTP requests by processing the decrypted HTTP requests and transferring the responses to said secure network interface.

18. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said secure web server comprises at least one web page file.

19. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data from said ACM CPU to said network interface.

20. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data to said ACM CPU.

21. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said secure web server configured to transfer ACM data from said ACM CPU to said secure network interface and embed said ACM data within said at least one web page file based on function tags embedded within said at least one web page file.

22. An ACM system in accordance with claim 14 wherein said web server configured to send said at least one web page file to said secure network interface.

23. An ACM system in accordance with claim 13 wherein said ACM comprises a backplane interface electrically connected to said ACM and a backplane electrically connected to said backplane interface, said backplane configured for connection with at least one of an input/output (I/O) module and an input module.

24. An ACM system in accordance with claim 17 wherein said network interface configured to receive said responses to the decrypted HTTP requests, encrypt said responses to the decrypted HTTP requests, and send the encrypted responses to through said network to said computer.

25. An ACM system in accordance with claim 24 wherein said computer configured to decrypt the encrypted responses.

26. A method for management and control of an automation control module (ACM) including an ACM central processing unit (CPU) and a web system electrically connected to the ACM and a network, said method comprising:

electrically connecting the web system to the ACM CPU; and

processing security layer encrypted hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) requests from the network using the web system.

27. A method in accordance with claim 26 wherein the web system includes a web server electronically connected to the ACM CPU and a secure network interface, the secure network interface electrically connected to the network, said processing security layer encrypted HTTP requests from the network using the web system comprising:

receiving the security layer encrypted HTTP requests from the network using the network interface;

decrypting the requests; and

transferring the decrypted requests to the web server.

28. A method in accordance with claim 29 wherein said processing security layer encrypted HTTP requests from the network using the web system further comprising:

processing the decrypted request using the web server;

transferring a web page representing a requested web page to the secure network interface;

encrypting the web page representing the requested web page using the secure network interface; and

sending the encrypted web page representing the requested web page through the network.