SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR CONDUCTING COMMUNICATIONS AMONG COMPONENTS OF MULTIDOMAIN INDUSTRIAL AUTOMATION SYSTEM

• US 20110258637A1
• Filed: 04/15/2010
• Published: 10/20/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 04/15/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Bezdicek, Jan, Slajs, Jakub, Bumbalek, Ladislav, Hall, Kenwood H.
• Granted Patent: US 8,984,533 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/314
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/4185 characterised by the network communication
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/31094 Data exchange between modules, cells, devices, processors
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/31122 Bridge between networks
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/02 Total factory control, e.g. smart factories, flexible manufacturing systems [FMS] or integrated manufacturing systems [IMS]

Abstract

An improved industrial automation system and communication system for implementation therein, and related methods of operation, are described herein. In at least some embodiments, the improved communication system allows communication in the form of messages between modules in different control or enterprise domains. Further, in at least some embodiments, such communications are achieved by providing a communication system including a manufacturing service bus having two internal service busses with a bridge between the internal busses. Also, in at least some embodiments, a methodology of synchronous messaging is employed.

Claims

1. A method of communicating between modules, the method comprising:

sending a first message from a first module, wherein the first module includes a first data transport layer and a first application object layer, the first message originating at the first application object layer and being sent out of the first module via the first data transport layer;

receiving the first message at a second module, wherein the second module includes a second data transport layer and one or both of a transaction layer and a second application object layer, the first message being received via the second data transport layer;

wherein the sending and receiving are governed by ladder logic and are performed in a synchronous manner, and wherein the first message is at least temporarily stored in a buffer after being received, prior to being acted upon by the ladder logic.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the sending includes synchronously sampling data from tags associated with the first message, wherein the sampled data is sent as part of the message.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the first message is a send instruction that is an IEC1131 instruction, and the sampled data from the tags is binary packed and placed into a tag buffer of the first module before being sent as part of one or more of (a) one or more messages including the first message or (b) one or message fragments.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising sending a second message from the second module back to the first module.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the first message is a query for a database, and wherein a second message that is a result data set from the database results from processing of the query.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the second module includes the transaction layer.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the transaction layer forms one or more standard interfaces suitable for facilitating communications with one or more enterprise business systems (EBSs).

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the transaction layer additionally forms one or more additional standard interfaces suitable for facilitating communications with one or more databases and message queue (MQ) entities.

9. The method of claim 6, wherein a common industrial protocol (CIP) stack facilitates communications between the data transport layers.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the second module includes the second application object layer, and wherein the first and second application object layers store data that is sent or received.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the application object layers additionally include application logic and other information required for data delivery.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein each of the first and second modules is a control-level module, and wherein the sending and receiving of the first message is achieved by way of communications involving a common industrial protocol (CIP).

13. The method of claim 12, wherein upon the second module receiving the first message, the second module performs each of a message queue (MQ) operation, a dispatch, and a method invocation and then completes its operation in response to the first message.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the first data transport layer includes a transmit manager and the second data transport layer includes a receive manager.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the first data transport layer operates to store data from tags associated with the first message in a buffer of the transmit manager prior to the sending of the first message, and the second data transport layer operates to store the data in a buffer of the receive manager upon receiving the first message.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the receive manager also reassembles packets into which the first message has been divided prior to being sent.

17. The method of claim 14, wherein the first data transport layer includes an additional receive manager and the second data transport layer includes an additional transmit manager, and wherein the first data transport layer sets a status bit indicating proper sending of the first message upon the additional receive manager receiving a conformational message of the proper sending from the additional transmit manager.

18. The method of claim 14, wherein the transmit and receive managers are configured to process a plurality of messages in addition to the first message.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the first message is selected by the first module from one or more of a set of messages in a queue and a set of topics.