Information subsystem congestion analysis of a wide area‐networked manufacturing system using mobile agents

Abstract

Purpose -The manufacturing paradigm is shifting from being a central system to a distributed system and is increasingly becoming dependent on wide area networks for the management of information services. The information subsystem employed in a manufacturing setting is susceptible to getting congested when used in a wide area network setting during peak hours. The issue of information and control subsystem integration and the characterization of network congestion have been researched in this paper using faded information field architecture. Design/methodology/approach -A wide area network was simulated with all its associated components like routers, switches, gateways, etc. by programming a simulation engine. The simulation engine mimicked a wide area network employed in a manufacturing enterprise. Findings -The architecture holds the promise to address the integration and congestion issues in a manufacturing system by employing autonomous decentralized and autonomous information fading techniques. Results show the effectiveness of the proposed technique in addressing the issue of network congestion in a distributed wide area network. Originality/value -The issue of information and control subsystems of a manufacturing system has been reported earlier. However, the network-centric problems like congestion during peak hours of operation have not been addressed in these emerging paradigms. The research reported in this paper focuses on the congestion issue and could be useful to wide area networked manufacturing system designers and managers.