Hierarchical and Concurrent ECCs for IEC 61499 Function Blocks

Abstract

IEC 61499 enables component-oriented descriptions 5 of complex industrial processes facilitating model-driven engineer-6 ing. One aspect that is lacking, however, is the ability to directly 7 express Statecharts-like hierarchy and concurrency within basic 8 function blocks (BFBs). Such features can significantly enhance 9 function blocks and help create more succinct and readable 10 specifications. We propose a new syntactic extension to the stan-11 dard called hierarchical and concurrent execution control chart 12 (HCECC). A major roadblock for any suggested changes to the 13 standard is the need for compliance. Our approach extends the 14 synchronous execution semantics of IEC 61499, where HCECCs 15 are purely syntactic sugar. Using a revised synchronous semantics, 16 our compiler generates standard compliant C code from HCECCs. 17Benchmarking and usability studies reveal the relative superiority 18 of the proposed approach over existing approaches.

Towards Topology-Free Programming for Cyber-Physical Systems with Process-Oriented Paradigm

“…Sinha et al in [38] proposed a hierarchical and concurrent ECC (HCECC) to model concurrent behaviors within the IEC 61499 paradigm. The HCECC-based function blocks utilize a multilevel hierarchical state machine to integrate concurrent and hierarchical behaviors and reduce system complexity.…”

A Survey of Static Formal Methods for Building Dependable Industrial Automation Systems

“…UML enables modeling of control logic [45], often leading to automatic code generation of standard PLC languages such as function blocks [46]. In [47], the IEC 61499 standard is extended to include UML-Statecharts features to reduce software complexity while ensuring automatic generation of standard-compliant code. Some works use formal languages or a combination of formal languages and industry standards for specifying system designs.…”

A Service-Oriented Programming Approach for Dynamic Distributed Manufacturing Systems

“…However, both standards lack formal model of computation (MoC). There have been efforts to introduce formal MoC into these standards such as [4], [5], but they lack mechanisms to handle dynamic changes. Attempts to introduce dynamic adaptations into IEC 61499 (such as [6] and [7]) and IEC 61131 (such as [8]) exist, however only partial/limited reconfiguration is enabled.…”