An object-oriented approach to the cell activity representation for an intelligent manufacturing system (IMS)

A new methodology for representing the interaction between machines and the interlock signals required in FMCs has been developed. Object-Oriented Philosophies (OOPs) lend themselves to the development of such a scheme. A methodology developed here regards the tasks to be performed by the cell or any of its constituent machines for being primal. Sensory signals indicating the changes of state pf machines are used to trigger or initiate tasks. A task may be simple and require a relatively short time to execute, or may be complex and lengthy. This methodology may be depicated by a set of diagrams called Task Initiation Diagram (TID) and their accompanying rules.