Cloud-based collaborative industrial automation design environment

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11308447-B2
Application number	US-202016838330-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 2, 2020
Priority date	Apr 2, 2020
Publication date	Apr 19, 2022
Grant date	Apr 19, 2022

Abstract

An industrial integrated development environment (IDE) supports collaborative tools that allow multiple designers and programmers to remotely submit design input to the same automation system project in parallel while maintaining project consistency. These collaborative features can include, for example, brokering between different sets of design input directed to the same portion of the system project, generating notifications to remote designers when a portion of the system project is modified, sharing of development interfaces or environments, facilitating involvement of outside technical support experts to assist with design issues, and other collaborative features.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A system for collaborative cloud-based development of industrial applications, comprising:
a processor, operatively coupled to a memory that executes executable components stored on a memory, wherein the processor and memory reside on a cloud platform, and the executable components comprise:
a user interface component configured to render integrated development environment (IDE) interfaces on respective client devices that remotely interface with the cloud platform, and to receive, via interaction with the IDE interfaces, industrial design input that defines aspects of an industrial automation project, wherein
the industrial design input selects automation objects to be included in the industrial automation project and defines one or more hierarchical relationships between the automation objects,
the automation objects represent respective industrial assets and comprise properties specific to the respective industrial assets, and
the properties of an automation object, of the automation objects, comprise at least two of an analytic routine, an alarm, a security feature, or a graphical representation of an industrial asset represented by the automation object;

a project generation component configured to generate system project data based on the industrial design input, wherein the system project data comprises the automation objects and the one or more hierarchical relationships; and
a collaboration component configured to, in response to receipt of first industrial design input from a first of the client devices defining a modification to a first aspect of the system project data, determine, based on the one or more hierarchical relationships between the automation objects, whether the modification will affect a second aspect of the system project data,
wherein the user interface component is further configured to, in response to a determination by the collaboration component that the modification will affect the second aspect, deliver, via the cloud platform, a notification to a second of the client devices associated with a user assigned to develop the second aspect of the system project data.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the collaboration component is further configured to perform a regression analysis on the system project data to determine interdependencies between aspects of the system project data, and to determine whether the modification will affect the second aspect further based on the interdependencies learned by the regression analysis.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein the interdependencies comprise at least one of a programmatic relationship between two or more control code segments defined by the system project data, a dependency between a control code segment and a visualization element defined by the system project data, or a dependency between a control code segment and an engineering drawing defined by the system project data.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the collaboration component is further configured to implement the modification to the first aspect of the system project data contingent on receipt of an approval of the modification from the second of the client devices.

5. The system of claim 1 , further comprising a simulation component configured to perform a simulation on the system project data and the modification to determine an estimated effect of the modification on the second aspect,
wherein the user interface component is configured to generate the notification to include a warning of the estimated effect.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the user interface component is configured to customize the IDE interfaces on the respective client devices in accordance with defined roles of users associated with the respective client devices.

7. The system of claim 6 , wherein
the defined roles include at least a lead developer role, and
the user interface component is configured to render, on a client device associated with the lead developer role, an IDE interface that at least one of permits design override privileges or tracks design contributions submitted by developers associated with other roles.

8. The system of claim 1 , further comprising a proxy component configured to, in response to a determination that assistance with development of a portion of the system project data is required, extend remote access to the portion of the system project data to a technical support entity via the cloud platform.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the proxy component is further configured to generate and send, to the technical support entity, contextual information relevant to development of the portion of the system project data, the contextual information comprising at least one of an identity of a device or machine that makes up the industrial automation project, a role of the device or machine within the industrial automation project, or a process that is upstream or downstream relative to the industrial automation project.

10. The system of claim 1 , wherein the system project data comprises at least one of an executable industrial control program, an industrial visualization application, industrial device configuration data configured to set a configuration parameter of an industrial device, an engineering drawing, or a bill of materials.

11. The system of claim 1 , wherein
the collaboration component is further configured to associate development note data received from one of the client devices via interaction with a first of the IDE interfaces with a selected portion of the system project data, and
the user interface component is configured to render the development note data on a second of the IDE interfaces rendered on another of the client devices in response to determining that the second of the IDE interfaces is rendering the selected portion of the system project data.

12. A method for cloud-based development of industrial control applications, comprising:
rendering, by a system that executes on a cloud platform and comprises a processor, integrated development environment (IDE) interfaces on respective client devices communicatively connected to the cloud platform;
generating, by the system, system project data based on industrial design input received from the client devices via interaction with the IDE interfaces, wherein
the industrial design input selects automation objects to be included in an industrial control and monitoring project and defines one or more hierarchical relationships between the automation objects, and
the automation objects represent respective industrial assets and comprise properties specific to the respective industrial assets, the properties comprising at least two of an analytic routine, an alarm, a security feature, or a graphical representation;

in response to receiving, from a first of the IDE interfaces, a first portion of the industrial design input defining a modification to a first aspect of the system project data, determining, by the system based on the one or more hierarchical relationships between the automation objects, whether implementation of the modification will affect a second aspect of the system project data; and
in response to determining that the implementation of the modification will affect the second aspect of the system project data, rendering, by the system on a second of the IDE interfaces associated with a user assigned to develop the second aspect of the system project data, a notification of the modification.

13. The method of claim 12 , further comprising:
learning interdependencies between aspects of the system project data based on a regression analysis performed on the system project data, and
determinin

Assignees

• Rockwell Automation Tech Inc

Inventors

• Stump Andrew R
• Carrara Anthony
• Srinivasan Eashwer
• Como Christopher W
• Billi-Duran Sharon M
• Ericsson Matthew R
• Dunn Ryan P

Classifications

• G06N20/00

  Machine learning · CPC title

• G05B19/41865 Primary

  characterised by job scheduling, process planning, material flow · CPC title

• G06F8/71

  Version control (security arrangements therefor G06F21/57); Configuration management · CPC title

• G06Q10/101 Primary

  Collaborative creation, e.g. joint development of products or services · CPC title

• G05B19/418 Primary

  Total factory control, i.e. centrally controlling a plurality of machines, e.g. direct or distributed numerical control [DNC], flexible manufacturing systems [FMS], integrated manufacturing systems [IMS] or computer integrated manufacturing [CIM] · CPC title