Method and system for remote supervisory control

• US 5,739,760 A
• Filed: 11/06/1995
• Issued: 04/14/1998
• Est. Priority Date: 02/08/1995
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Fujitsu Limited
• Original Assignee: Fujitsu Limited
• Inventors: Hatakeyama, Satomi
• Primary Examiner(s): Horabik, Michael
• Assistant Examiner(s): Beaulieu, Yonel
• Application Number:
  US08/554,040
• Time in Patent Office: 890 Days
• Field of Search: 340/825.15, 340/825.06, 340/825.07, 340/825.02, 340/825.2, 340/825.52, 340/825.03, 340/825.17, 340/506, 340/870.02, 379/106, 379/165, 364/132, 395/290
• US Class Current: 340/3.32
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 23/0208 characterized by the configuration of the monitoring system

Abstract

A remote supervisory control system is provided in which a master system performs monitoring and control of a plurality of slave systems, maintaining the fine control capability of the past, while enabling implementation with the minimum memory capacity. The master system is connected, via channels, to a plurality of slave systems, each of which has a plurality of individual control points in its purview. The plurality of individual control points are grouped into groups of individual control points having the same attributes, prescribed operations being performed on the status information of all individual control points within each group, the results of these calculations being taken as the status information of a representative control point. This status information is collected in memories located within the master system. The status information of the representative control point can, if necessary, be expanded to the status information of each individual control point and monitored, enabling separate control of the individual control points, and it is also possible to restore to monitoring and control of the original representative control point.

Claims

1. A method for remote supervisory control, in which there are a plurality of slave systems, each of said slave systems having a plurality of individual control points in its purview, and performing monitoring of and control of the statuses of each of the individual control points, and a master system which is connected to each of said slave systems via channels, and which performs overall monitoring of the statuses of, or control with respect to, said plurality of individual control points of each of the slave systems, wherein:

in each said slave system said plurality of individual control points are divided beforehand into groups of individual control points having the same attribute;

a pre-established operation is performed beforehand With respect to said statuses of said plurality of individual control points of each divided group, the results of said operation being taken as the status of a representative control point which represents said group;

and further wherein by notifying said master system of the status of said representative control point, overall monitoring is performed with respect to said plurality of individual control points.

2. A method for remote supervisory control according to claim 1, wherein said master system is notified from each said slave system not only of the status of said representative control point, but also of the status of prescribed individual control points, and further wherein monitoring is performed at the master system without making distinction, with regard to the notified statuses, between a status related to said representative control point and a status related to the individual control point.

3. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 1, wherein when notification is made from said master system of control with respect to said representative control point in one said slave system, that representative control point is restored to information with respect to said group, expansion being performed to all said individual control points which make up said group, and control is performed with respect to each expanded individual control point.

4. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 3, wherein when said master system performs control with respect to said representative control point, and also when said master system performs control with respect to said individual control point, control is performed without making distinction, between a status related to a said representative control point and a status related to the individual control points.

5. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 3, wherein in a part of the information related to said representative control point and said individual control point, notification of which information is given respectively from said master system to each said slave system, a flag is added which indicates whether monitoring and control are to be performed with respect to said representative control point or said individual control points, and wherein only when said flag which indicates that monitoring and control is to be performed with respect to said individual control points is set, a memory means within said master system is expanded, the statuses of each expanded said individual control point which makes up said representative control point being collected in an expanded storage area in said expanded memory means.

6. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 5, wherein in a part of the information related to said representative control point and said individual control points, notification of which information is given from each said slave system to said master system, a flag is added which indicates whether monitoring and control are to be performed with respect to said representative control point or said individual control point, and wherein only when said flag which indicates that monitoring and control is to be performed with respect to said individual control points is set, notification is made to the master system of the statuses of each expanded said individual control point which makes up said representative control point.

7. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 5, wherein only when the flag which indicates that monitoring and control are to be performed with respect to said representative control point is set, said expanded memory means within said master system is compressed, and monitoring and control are once again performed with respect to said representative control point.

8. A method of remote supervisory control according to claim 6, wherein only when the flag which indicates that monitoring and control are to be performed with respect to said representative control point is set, within said slave system including said representative control point restoration is made to said monitoring and control with respect to said representative control point.

9. A system for remote supervisory control, comprising a plurality of slave systems, each of said slave systems having a plurality of individual control points in its purview, and performing monitoring of and control of the statuses of each of the individual control points, and a master system which is connected to each of said slave systems via channels, and which performs overall monitoring of the statuses of, or control with respect to, said plurality of individual control points of each of the slave systems, wherein each of said slave system comprises:

an individual control point table which holds information related to the statuses of each individual control point, which are collected from each said individual control point;

a representative control point table holding statuses which represent a group of a plurality of said individual control points having the same attributes;

a slave-side status change processing means which, when there is a status change in the information related to the statuses of each individual control point collected from each said individual control point, supplies that information as is to said individual control point table, and which supplies said representative control point table with said information after a pre-established operation is performed with respect to said statuses of said plurality of individual control points;

a slave-side representative point configuration file into which are minimally stored the correspondence relationship between said representative control point and said individual control points which belong to it and an arithmetic expression which defines said operation; and

a slave-side expansion/restoration processing means which works in concert with said individual control point table, said representative control point table, and said slave-side representative point configuration file either to expand processing with respect to a representative control point to processing of said individual control points or to restore processing with respect to expanded individual control point to processing with respect to said representative control point.

10. A system for remote supervisory control, comprising a plurality of slave systems, each of said slave systems having a plurality of individual control points in its purview, and performing monitoring of and control of the statuses of each of the individual control points, and a master system which is connected to each of said slave systems via channels, and which performs overall monitoring of the statuses of, or control with respect to, said plurality of individual control points of each of the slave systems, wherein said master system comprises:

a common control point table holding in common both information related to a status which represents the statuses of each of a plurality of grouped individual control points which have the same attribute and information related to the status of and collected from said individual control points;

a master-side representative point configuration file into which are stored minimally both the relationship of a representative control point representing said grouped individual control points and said individual control points which belong thereto and address information which specifies dynamically expanded or compressed storage area of said common control point table;

a master-side expansion/restoration processing means which works in concert with said common control point table and a slave-side representative point configuration file either to expand processing with respect to a representative control point to processing of said individual control points or to restore processing with respect to expanded individual control points to processing with respect to said representative control point; and

a master-side status change processing means which performs overwriting of said status in said common control point table each time there is a change therein, and which, in the case in which expansion of processing with respect to a representative control point to processing of said individual control points or restoration of processing with respect to expanded individual control points to processing with respect to said representative control point is to be performed, references said master-side representative point configuration file to perform the overwriting of said status.