Data perspectives in controller system and production management systems

• US 7,526,794 B2
• Filed: 09/30/2005
• Issued: 04/28/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Rockwell Automation Technologies Incorporated (Allen-Bradley Co., Inc.)
• Inventors: Kalan, Michael D., Hood, Gavan W., Baier, John J., Chand, Sujeet, Hall, Kenwood H., Briant, Stephen C.
• Primary Examiner(s): SMITHERS, MATTHEW
• Application Number:
  US11/241,411
• Publication Number:
  US 20070079355A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,306 Days
• Field of Search: 726/2
• US Class Current: 726/2
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/054 Input/output
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 19/408 characterised by data handling or data format, e.g. reading, buffering or conversion of data
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/13137 Interpreter considers hierarchy of plc in system structure for programming it
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/24162 Biometric sensor, fingerprint as user access password
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/24167 Encryption, password, user access privileges
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2141 Access rights, e.g. capability lists, access control lists, access tables, access matrices
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/80 Management or planning

Abstract

A programmable logic controller is disclosed that filters and presents to a user data that conforms to a hierarchically structured data model. The programmable logic controller through utilization of an input component that receives data and a filter component that filters the data based at least in part on one or more filtering criteria is able to extract data that is relevant to an individual user'"'"'s needs and/or requirements. The filtering criteria utilized by the filtering component can include passwords and group affiliations as well as the user'"'"'s biometric and/or anthropometric information. The claimed subject matter further relates to a component that can be utilized to provide a similar filtering functionality with respect to legacy programmable logical controllers, and legacy industrial automation devices.

Claims

1. A programmable logic controller, comprising:

an interface component associated with the programmable logic controller that receives data of a hierarchical structure; and

a filter component communicatively coupled with the interface component that filters the data based at least in part on one or more lustration criteria, the lustration criteria includes one or more of;

factory presets, biometric information, passwords, or geographical information.

2. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the data of the hierarchical structure conforms to one or more of ISA S88, ISA S95 and OMAC.

3. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the filter component creates the data of the hierarchical structure.

4. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the programmable logic controller communes with an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system that utilizes the data of the hierarchical structure.

5. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the programmable logic controller communicates with a Supply-Chain Management (SCM) system that utilizes the data of the hierarchical structure.

6. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the data of the hierarchical structure comprises one or more multi-tiered tree.

7. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the biometric information comprises one or more of human physiological characteristic, anthropometric information, signature recognition, gait recognition and typing rhythm recognition.

8. The programmable logic controller of claim 7, the human physiological characteristic includes at least one of fingerprints, retina recognition, iris recognition, voice patter recognition.

9. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the anthropometric information includes one or more of length of head, length of limb, length of digits, length of body, weight of body, individual markings.

10. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the filter component comprises:

a security component that grants access to the data of a hierarchical structure based at least in part on the one or more lustration parameters; and

a mapping component that maps data of a hierarchical structure into at least one data format comprehensible by one or more industrial automation device.

11. The programmable logic controller of claim 10, the security component employs one or more facial recognition algorithm to perform facial recognition.

12. The programmable logic controller of claim 11, the facial recognition algorithm includes one or more of eigenface, fisherface, hidden markov model and neuronal motivated dynamic link matching.

13. The programmable logic controller of claim 10, the security component employs access control list to ensure privilege separation.

14. The programmable logic controller of claim 10, the security component generates one or more log files.

15. The programmable logic controller of claim 14, the one or more log file contains at least one of biometric information, geographical location information, user identification data, and group identification data.

16. The programmable logic controller of claim 1, the interface component associated with a legacy intermediary component, comprising:

a reception component that receives hierarchically structured data; and

an elutriation component that fractionates the hierarchically structured data based at least on the lustration criteria.

17. The legacy intermediary component of claim 16, the elutriation component comprises:

a security component that utilizes the at least one lustration criteria to generate a customized view of the hierarchically structured data; and

a interface generation component that displays the customized view.

18. The legacy intermediary component of claim 17, the elutriation component further comprises a machine reasoning and learning component utilized by the security component to generate the customized view of the hierarchically structured data.

19. The legacy intermediary component of claim 18, the machine reasoning and learning component employs one or more classification approaches.

20. The legacy intermediary component of claim 19, the one or more classification approaches based at least in part on Bayesian networks, decision trees, fuzzy logic models, probabilistic and classification models.

21. The legacy intermediary component of claim 17, the interface generation component utilizes at least one or more of HTML, SGML, XML, BSML, to generate a customized user interface.

22. The legacy intermediary component of claim 16, the elutriation component further comprises a mapping component that maps hierarchically structured data into one or more format comprehensible by one or more programmable logic controller and one or more industrial automation device.

23. The legacy intermediary component of claim 22, the one or more industrial automation device includes one or more of a motor staffer, one or more motor, at least one solenoid, one or more pilot lights, one or more displays, one or more speed drives and one or more valves.

24. The legacy intermediary component of claim 16, the elutriation component further comprises a reconstruction component that employs one or more predefined templates to reconstitute data received from one or more industrial automation device into hierarchically structured data.

25. A computer implemented method to facilitate granting access to hierarchically structured data, comprising the following computer-executable acts:

employing a programmable logic controller to receive hierarchically structured data;

utilizing a graphical user interface to access user credentials from a user;

accessing security information related to the hierarchically structured data;

evaluating the security information and the user credentials utilizing machine learning; and

based on the evaluation, according access to the hierarchically structured data.

26. The method of claim 25, further comprising generating the graphical user interface utilizing at least one or more of HTML, SGML, XML, and BSML.

27. The method of claim 25, the user credentials includes biometric data comprises at least one of iris recognition, voice pattern recognition, signature recognition, body weight, individual markings, and gait recognition.

28. The method of claim 25, the user credentials including geographical location of the programmable logic controller.

29. The method of claim 28, further comprising utilizing one or more of a Ground Positioning System (GPS) and Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) to determine the geographical location of the programmable logic controller.

30. The method of claim 25, further including building an ad hoc data network, comprising:

determining whether hierarchically structured data is received;

based on the determination, setting a software timer;

polling one or more adjacent programmable logic controllers;

ascertaining whether the one or more adjacent programmable logic controllers generated a response to the polling;

reconstructing information from the one or more responding programmable logic controllers; and

utilizing a machine learning and reasoning component nominate one of the one or more responding programmable logic controllers to be a master.

31. The method of claim 25, further including disengaging from an ad hoc data network, comprising:

ascertaining whether a master programmable logic controller is in independent mode;

determining whether the master programmable logic controller has received hierarchically structured data from one or more external data source;

establishing whether one or more adjacent programmable logic controllers are receiving hierarchically structured data from the one or more external data source;

based on the establishing, stopping a hardware timer; and

disengaging the one or more adjacent programmable logic controllers from accessing the master programmable logic controller.

32. A programmable logic controller, comprising:

an interface component that transmits hierarchically structured data in response to a user request; and

a filter component that filters the data transmitted by the interface component based at least in part on at least one filtering parameter, the interface component, the filter component and the programmable logic controller integrated to form a single indivisible unit, the filter component utilizes a machine learning and reasoning component in conjunction with the at least one filtering parameter to produce a subset of an entirety of the hierarchically structured data in response to the user request.

33. The programmable logic controller of claim 32, the data transmitted by the interface component comprises a subset of a totality of the hierarchically structured data.

34. A controller, comprising:

means for receiving data structured hierarchically;

means for fractionating the data structured hierarchically based on one or more filtering parameter into one or more fractionated datum using a machine reasoning and learning approach; and

means for displaying the one or more fractionated datum.

35. The controller of claim 34, the filtering parameters include one or more factory presets, biometric information, passwords, group affiliations and geographical information.

36. The controller of claim 34, further including creating an ad hoc network during network failure, further comprising:

means for determining whether hierarchically structured data is received;

means for setting a timer based on the determination made whether hierarchically structured data is received;

means for polling one or more adjacent controllers;

means for determining whether one of the adjacent controllers responds to the poll;

means for at least one of entering standalone mode or reconstructing information based on the response to the poll of the one or more adjacent controllers; and

means for nominating a master controller when information is reconstructed.

37. The controller of claim 34, the means for fractionating data further comprising:

means for fractionating the data structured hierarchically based on at least one of factory presets, biometric information, passwords, group affiliations and geographical information; and

means for displaying a customized view based on the one or more fractionated datum.