Industrial IDE Collaboration for Parallel Automation Development
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing industrial automation systems require separate and piecemeal development environments for different aspects, leading to inefficiencies in integration, debugging, and lack of collaborative development capabilities.
Innovation Solution
An integrated development environment (IDE) that supports collaborative development of industrial automation systems, allowing multiple developers to work on a project simultaneously while ensuring project consistency, using a common data model and automation objects, and facilitating integration of control, visualization, and configuration.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of manufacture
If separate development environments are used for different aspects of industrial automation, then each aspect can be developed independently, but integration and debugging become inefficient and collaborative development is not supported
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple separate development environments (control programming, visualization development, configuration tools) into a single integrated development environment (IDE). This unification allows developers to work on different aspects of industrial automation projects simultaneously within one interface, eliminating the need for separate tools and improving integration efficiency.
Solution Approach 2:
The IDE is designed to perform multiple functions that were previously handled by separate tools. It supports control programming, visualization development, system configuration, and collaborative development features all in one environment, making it a universal platform for industrial automation project development.
2Productivity
If multiple developers work on the same project simultaneously in separate environments, then individual work can proceed in parallel, but project consistency cannot be ensured and collaboration is difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The IDE implements real-time feedback mechanisms that monitor and track changes made by different developers. The system provides immediate notifications when conflicts arise and automatically manages version control, ensuring that all developers work from the latest project state and maintaining consistency across the entire project.
Solution Approach 2:
The IDE acts as an intermediary between multiple developers working on the same project. It manages concurrent access, resolves conflicts automatically or through coordinated workflows, and ensures that all changes are integrated consistently, allowing parallel development while maintaining project integrity.
3Productivity
If a comprehensive integrated environment is provided for all automation aspects, then integration and collaboration improve, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The IDE is organized into distinct modules or workspaces for different development tasks (control programming, visualization, configuration). Each module handles specific functions independently but integrates seamlessly with others through a unified project model, reducing perceived complexity while maintaining comprehensive functionality.
Solution Approach 2:
The IDE uses a universal project data model and common interface conventions across all modules. This standardized approach allows the system to handle diverse development tasks through consistent mechanisms, reducing the complexity that would otherwise arise from managing multiple separate tools with different interfaces and data formats.
Data Source
AI summary
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.