AUTOMATED CREATION OF INDUSTRIAL DASHBOARDS AND WIDGETS

• US 20170123397A1
• Filed: 10/30/2015
• Published: 05/04/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/30/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Billi, Sharon M., Reissner, Kyle K., Walter, Jonathan D., Singhai, Mohit, Reichard, Douglas J., Sandler, Scott N., Bliss, Ronald E., Pantaleano, Michael J., Cahalane, Ryan, McCleave, Bruce T., Como, Christopher W., Gray, Edward A., Korpela, Jessica
• Granted Patent: US 10,528,021 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 15/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/048 Monitoring; Safety
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/4184 characterised by fault tolerance, reliability of production system
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/24015 Monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0484 for the control of specific functions or operations, e.g. selecting or manipulating an object, an image or a displayed text element, setting a parameter value or selecting a range
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/063 Operations research, analysis or management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0639 Performance analysis of employees; Performance analysis of enterprise or organisation operations
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/206 Drawing of charts or graphs
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/02 Total factory control, e.g. smart factories, flexible manufacturing systems [FMS] or integrated manufacturing systems [IMS]

Abstract

A multi-platform industrial search and notification system performs automated and manually initiate information searches across multiple disparate industrial data platforms. The search system is built on a search platform that unifies plant-wide control system information from multiple diverse sources under a common namespace, or federated data model. The system can monitor this federated data model for conditions that may warrant attention by plant personnel, and deliver proactive notifications and operational data to selected users via their personal devices. The system can customize presentation of this data based on the user'"'"'s role, location, and/or other contextual information. To this end, the system can automatically generate user-specific and context-specific dashboards, widgets, or other visualizations, and render these custom visualizations to the user at appropriate times.

Claims

1. A system for generation and delivery of industrial dashboards, comprising:

a memory that stores computer-executable components;

a processor, operatively coupled to the memory, that executes the computer-executable components, the computer-executable components comprising;

a monitoring component configured to determine that one or more industrial data items maintained in a federated data model satisfy a criterion defined by a monitoring rule indicative of a performance issue relating to an industrial asset;

a notification component configured to identify a user to be notified of the performance issue and a user role associated with the user; and

a dashboard component configured to generate a visualization window for presentation of data relating to the performance issue based on the user role and a location of the user within an industrial environment.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the data relating to the performance issue comprises at least one of current status information for an industrial device related to the performance issue, maintenance history information for the industrial device, production history data for a workcell or machine relating to the performance issue, energy consumption data for the workcell or machine, inventory information for a replacement part determined to be required to address the performance issue, a link to documentation for the industrial device, or a link to an external data source comprising information relevant to the performance issue.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the user role comprises at least one of a machine operator role, a maintenance role, an engineering role, a management role, or an accounting role.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the dashboard component is configured to embed, within the visualization window, a human-machine interface screen that renders a graphical representation of an industrial process affected by the performance issue.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the dashboard component is further configured to, in response to a determination that the user role is associated with permission to view industrial control programming, generate the visualization window to include a control for launching a program viewer that renders a control program being executed by an industrial controller related to the performance issue.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the notification component is further configured to select the user based on at least one of a proximity of the user to a source of the performance issue or a determined area of expertise of the user.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the dashboard component is further configured to at least one of filter the data relating to the performance issue or format the data relating to the performance issue based on the user role.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the dashboard component is further configured to generate the visualization window to include, as the data relating to the performance issue, operational or status information for a set of machines within the industrial environment determined to be within a defined distance from the location of the user.

9. The system of claim 1, further comprising an indexing component configured to discover available data items, including the one or more industrial data items, distributed across multiple data sources of the industrial environment and record instances and locations of the available data items in the federated data model.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the indexing component is further configured to infer a relationship between two industrial devices based on analysis of the federated data model, and to generate the visualization window to include data relating to the two industrial devices based on the relationship.

11. A method for generating a visual notification of an industrial event, comprising:

determining, by a system comprising a processor, that one or more industrial data items indexed in a federated data model indicate occurrence of an event by an industrial automation system for which attention is required;

selecting, by the system, a recipient for a notification of the event;

generating, by the system, a dashboard graphic that renders event data relating to the event based on a role associated with the recipient and a location of the recipient relative to the industrial automation system; and

sending, by the system, the dashboard graphic to a client device associated with the recipient.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the generating comprises generating the dashboard graphic to include, as the event data, at least one of current status information for the industrial automation system, maintenance history information for the industrial automation system, production history data for the industrial automation system, energy consumption data for the industrial automation system, inventory information for a replacement part determined to be required in response to the event, a link to documentation for an industrial device of the industrial automation system, or a link to an external data source comprising information relevant to the event.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the generating comprises at least one of hiding a subset of available data relating to the event or formatting the available data relating to the event based on at least one of the user role or the location of the user relative to the industrial automation system.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the generating comprises, in response to determining that the role is associated with permission to view industrial control programming, generate the dashboard graphic to include a control for launching a program viewer that renders a control program being executed by an industrial controller associated with the industrial automation system.

15. The method of claim 11, wherein the selecting comprises selecting the recipient based on at least one of a proximity of the recipient to the industrial automation system or a determined area of expertise of the recipient.

16. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

deploying a discovery agent on a plant network;

receiving information from the discovery agent about available data items, including the one or more industrial data items, located on multiple data sources of an industrial environment; and

indexing respective locations of the data items in the federated data model.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising inferring a relationship between two industrial devices within the industrial environment based on analysis of the federated data model, wherein the generating the dashboard graphic comprises generating the dashboard graphic to include information relating to the two industrial devices based on the relationship.

18. A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon instructions that, in response to execution, cause a system comprising a processor to perform operations, the operations comprising:

determining that one or more industrial data items indexed in a federated data model satisfy a criterion indicative of a performance issue relating to an industrial asset;

selecting a recipient for a notification of the performance issue;

generating a dashboard display that renders event data relating to the performance issue based on a role associated with the recipient and a location of the recipient relative to a source of the performance issue; and

sending the dashboard display to a client device associated with the recipient.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein the generating comprises generating the dashboard display to include, as the event data, at least one of current status information for the industrial asset, maintenance history information for the industrial asset, production history data the industrial asset, energy consumption data for the industrial asset, inventory information for a replacement part determined to be required to address the performance issue, a link to documentation for the industrial asset, or a link to an external data source comprising information relevant to the performance issue.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein the generating comprises at least one of hiding a subset of available data relating to the performance issue or formatting the available data relating to the performance issue based on at least one of the role or the location of the recipient relative to a source of the performance issue.