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Last modified: October 24, 2003
Planning and Scheduling in the Manufacturing Environment

[Provisional document]

Overview

[Provisional document under design. To provide references for specifications and industry standardization initiatives relating to advanced planning and scheduling, shop floor automation, material requirements planning, manufacturing execution systems, enterprise resource planning, production planning and scheduling, production workflow, scheduling logic, and related topics.]

Projects

American Production and Inventory Control Society (APICS)

The mission of APICS is "to continue to set the standard as the recognized global leader and premier provider of resource management education and information for individuals and organizations..."

The APICS Dictionary is a recognized resource "for the latest industry terms and definitions. The recently released 10th edition contains 3,500 of the most current terms based on the continually expanding APICS body of knowledge. The dictionary establishes a common language, which enables organizations, individuals, and the entire supply chain to operate more productively and profitably. Subscribers can view the full list of dictionary terms or search by term, letter, or keyword..."

References:

Business to Manufacturing Markup Language (B2MML)

"World Batch Forum (WBF) is a non-profit, professional organization established in 1994 promoting the exchange of information related to the management, operation and automation of batch process manufacturing. It is dedicated to supporting the process automation and operations needs of the technical and management professions in batch and related process manufacturing. WBF will facilitate the interchange and development of information and knowledge in order to help its members succeed and to exert a positive influence on industry. WBF is an association of end-users, vendors, consultants and academics with a strict, non-commercial agenda. In addition to hosting an annual conference with formal presentation and technical papers, WBF provides organization, management, and structure to facilitate networking among its members and sharing of knowledge and information related to all aspects of batch processing..."

The Business To Manufacturing Markup Language (B2MML) produced by WBF's XML Working Group "provides a set of XML schemas based upon the ANSI/ISA 95 family of standards. The schemas were written using the World Wide Web Consortium's XML Schema language (XSD). B2MML may be used to integrate business systems such as ERP and supply chain management systems with manufacturing systems such as control systems and manufacturing execution systems. B2MML is a complete implementation of the ANSI/ISA 95 standards... Any company may use B2MML royalty free provided credit is given to the WBF. For more information on B2MML refer to the documentation contained in the downloads; the documents are organized around the ANSI/ISA 95 data models with an extra document for the Common schema, which includes complex and simple types used in the other schemas..."

References:

Computer Aided Manufacturing Using XML (CAMX)

IPC (Association Connecting Electronics Industries; previously "Institute for Printed Circuits" and "Institute of Interconnecting and Packaging Electronic Circuits") is a "United States-based trade association dedicated to furthering the competitive excellence and financial success of its members worldwide, who are participants in the electronic interconnect industry. IPC brings together all of the players in this industry: designers, board manufacturers, assembly companies, suppliers, and original equipment manufacturers. As IPC members, proactive participants work together to meet the challenges of ensuring the future of a very important industry..."

"The WebStds.ipc.org web site provides information on the standards being developed through the American National Standardization Institute (ANSI) process by the IPC and members of NEMI. Each standard starts with the development of a Project Initiation Notification (PINS) document which is required by the ANSI system. The e-commerce chart shows the relationship of the various standards and how they work together to manage business to business (B2B) transactions..."

The IPC-2501 'CAMX Framework' Standard (July 2003) "establishes the governing semantics and an XML based syntax for shop floor communication between electronic assembly equipment and associated software applications. IPC-2501 outlines the communication architecture and supporting XML messages. The standard also describes a messaging interface that is based upon an architecture whereby a single logical middleware server (the Message Broker) exchanges messages among Clients in a Domain. The following schemas are a part of the standard: MessageInfo.xsd; GetDomainConfiguration.xsd; DomainConfiguration.xsd; DomainConfigurationChange.xsd; GetMessage.xsd; Acknowledge.xsd; Error.xsd.

IPC-2540 Shop Floor Communication (CAMX) "consists of the IPC-2540 standards, which define shop-floor data in the form of XML messages, and IPC-2501, which defines how these messages are to be exchanged in a CAMX environment. These standards leverage GenCAM, the industry standard that defines how product data for PCBs should be described, including information needed for tooling, manufacturing, assembly, inspection and testing requirements. The IPC-2540 standards were developed, defined and standardized through the NEMI Plug and Play Factory Project. Development of IPC-2501 started with the Plug and Play Project and continues through Georgia Tech's Framework Implementation Project..."

Tutorial abstract for Computer Aided Manufacturing Using XML (CAMX), presented by Jose L. Martinez Lastra at the First IEEE Conference on Industrial Informatics (INDIN'03): "Information-Intensive Shop Floor Automation: Challenges for Current Equipment Control Devices and Potential Solutions." Excerpt: "In December 1997, the National Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (NEMI) launched the NEMI Plug and Play Factory Project. The goal of the project was to develop the necessary infrastructure for achieving interoperability among software applications and production equipment in electronics manufacturing. The PnP Factory project was the initial answer to the main findings of the NEMI roadmaps in the field of factory information systems (FIS); the roadmap identified that FIS are too expensive and too inflexible to adapt the new business conditions in electronics production. One of the results of the NEMI PnP Factory project was to suggest the use of message-oriented middleware (MOM) that passes XML messages by HTTP. As a consequence several international IPC committees were launched in order to standardize the messages that will be exchanged. As a result of the NEMI roadmaps, the PnP factory project and the work carried out within the different IPC committees in order to ensure agile factory information systems, a set of new technologies has arrived to industrial automation from the office automation deploying computer aided manufacturing using XML (CAMX). The need for real-time coordination, data collection, deployable systems, reconfiguration and web access continues to grow in importance in the field of automation. These new needs call for an information-intensive approach to the control and supervision of automation systems that cannot be provided by current controllers in a cost-efficient manner..."

References:

IMS Project Global Optimization-Oriented MES

IMS Domestic Project: "Global Optimization-oriented Manufacturing Execution System in Uncertain Environment." Project summary: "Manufacturing systems are often forced to operate in uncertain environment due to both external and internal causes. Nevertheless they are required to gain maximum profit by the global optimization of them, minimizing the influence of uncertain factors. Therefore by applying optimization techniques and XML techniques, etc., we are going to research a building technique of optimum manufacturing execution systems in which appropriate allocation of workers, balancing of worker's loads, appropriate volume of stocks, and reduction of planning load of managers, etc. are demanded...

The research items are: (1) Scheduling technique synchronizing all manufacturing tasks with the bottlenecks; (2) A technique for realizing inter-sectional cooperative scheduling by applying the 'PUSH-PULL' method; (3) Scheduling technique for handling multiple overlapping large-scale manufacturing projects; (4) Measuring technique for operation time of workers who are in charge of multiple kind of tasks and move around..."

By the fiscal year 2002, Kawasaki Heavy Industries and FUJITSU have joined the NGMS project, and Hosei University has played an important role in the GLOBEMEN project.

Cooperation technique based on the information exchange with XML and/or PSLX: "In the GLOBEMEN project, we have developed a prototype of inter-company SCM system by utilizing XML and PSLX which are data exchange formats. We are going to research information systems related to the prototype and the operation protocol of them, and develop an inter-section cooperative scheduling technique based on 'PUSH-PULL' method in this project. Besides, we have established a computer aided training technique for manufacturing utilizing XML in the NGMS project, and so we have the research background of applying the 'PSLX' which is a planning language based on XML... We are going to investigate a scheduling technique which can globally optimize a manufacturing system by applying the TOC in which machines or workers whose workload are high are regarded as bottlenecks. For applying the TOC to manufacturing systems, it is very important to identify bottlenecks, which usually vary according to the fluctuation of production items and volumes, by analyzing the scheduling result, and to evaluate appropriate volume of work-in-process. And we are going to research a scheduling technique considering them. We are going to research a technique applying the 'PUSH-PULL' method to inter-section cooperative scheduling which can minimize manufacturing lead-time and work-in-process in a whole manufacturing system that is in an uncertain environment due to large demand fluctuation. The 'PUSH-PULL' method is a scheduling logic which indicates 'PUSH' production in the bottleneck processes for realizing their maximum rate of operation and 'PULL' production in the non-bottleneck processes for reducing work-in-processes thoroughly..."

References:

ISA S95 Standard for Enterprise-Control System Integration

"ISA is globally recognized as a standards writing organization, developing consensus standards for automation, security, safety, batch control, control valves, fieldbus, environmental conditions, measurement, and symbols. Accredited by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), ISA has published more than 135 standards, recommended practices, and technical reports, through the dedicated efforts of a network of industry experts."

The scope of ISA-SP95, Enterprise/Control Integration Committee is to "(1) define in detail an abstract model of the enterprise, including manufacturing control functions and business functions, and its information exchange; (2) establish common terminology for the description and understanding of enterprise, including manufacturing control functions and business process functions, and its information exchange; (3) define electronic information exchange between the manufacturing control functions and other enterprise functions including data models and exchange definitions... Its purpose is to create a standard that will define the interface between control functions and other enterprise functions based upon the Purdue Reference Model for CIM (hierarchical form) as published by ISA. The interface initially considered is the interface between levels 3 and 4 of that model. Additional interfaces will be considered, as appropriate. The goal is to reduce the risk, cost, and errors associated with implementing these interfaces. The standard must define information exchange that is robust, safe, and cost effective. The exchange mechanism must preserve the integrity of each system's information and span of control..."

From J. Unger (Chair): "The ISA-SP95 committee has published the first two standards of a series that will define the interfaces between enterprise activities and control activities. ANSI/ISA-95.00.01-2000, Enterprise-Control System Integration, Part 1: Models and Terminology, provides standard terminology and a consistent set of concepts and models for integrating control systems with enterprise systems that will improve communications between all parties involved. The models and terminology emphasize good integration practices of control systems with enterprise systems during the entire life cycle of the systems. The second standard in the series, ANSI/ISA-95.00.02-2001, Enterprise-Control System Integration, Part 2: Object Models Attributes, contains additional details and examples to help explain and illustrate the Part 1 objects..."

References:

OASIS Production Planning and Scheduling Technical Committee

[October 24, 2003]   OASIS Members Form Production Planning and Scheduling Technical Committee.    Representatives from Hitachi, Fujitsu, and the PSLX Consortium have joined with other individual members to form a new OASIS Production Planning and Scheduling Technical Committee. The nine members proposing the PPS work will focus on "production planning and production scheduling problems in manufacturing industries. The categories of manufacturers and types of manufacturing processes are not restricted; in scope are production planning and scheduling problems relating to a master production schedule, detail production schedule, material requirement planning, capacity requirement planning, production order management, and loading and dispatching in a shop floor. As a starting point, specifications published by PSLX Consortium will be discussed as one possible contribution to the standardization process. The PSLX Consortium specifications contain wide variety of information about planning and scheduling in manufacturing industries," including abstract models and data dictionaries. Some of these specifications are now being considered for stardization in ISO/TC184/SC5, "Architecture, Communications and Integration Frameworks, as described in SC5 Resolution 448. The OASIS TC will only deal with the XML Specification PSLX-04 which "prescribes how to represent the production planning and scheduling information by XML, and how to implement the interfaces on computers." The initial Committee Draft TC deliverable is expected to provide outlines of target applications of production planning and scheduling problems, list appropriate business execution messages for production planning and scheduling, define rules for an application in responding the business execution messages, and present XML schemas for each business execution message. Specifications produced by the TC will be of interest to system integrators and software vendors focusing on production planning and scheduling problems in manufacturing industries. The PPS TC's first meeting wlll be held December 18, 2003 in Tokyo. The TC Convenor and Proposed Chair is Yasuyuki Nishioka of the PSLX Consortium and Hosei University.

References:

OMG Manufacturing Domain Task Force

References:

ISO/TC184/SC5: Architecture, Communications and Integration Frameworks

ISO/TC184/SC5 "Architecture, communications and integration frameworks" [Architecture, communications et structures d'intégration] operates in the area of "standardization for the field of enterprise architecture, communications and processes to enable manufacturing system integration, interworking, and interoperability. This standardization includes (1) an automation glossary; (2) process representations, i.e., exchange/negotiation in manufacturing enterprises; (3) requirements for a global programming environment; (4) manufacturing profiles likely to be utilized by industry. Active SC5 working groups and joint working groups as of 2003-02 included: WG 1 (Modeling and Architecture); WG 2 (Communications and Interconnections); WG 4 (Manufacturing Software and its Environment); WG 5 (Open System Application Frameworks); WG 6 (Application Service Interface); JWG 8 (Manufacturing Process and Management Information - administered by ISO/TC 184/SC 4); JWG 15 (Enterprise-Control System Integration - administered by IEC/SC 65A). [adapted from Report of the ISO/TC 184/SC 5 Secretariat N750]

ISO/TC184/SC5 took resolution 448 inviting Japan to investigate possibilities of collaborating with SC 5 on standardization of certain aspects of PSLX Consortium work. See "Resolution 448: Presentation On Planning and Scheduling." Resolutions of the 21st Meeting of ISO/TC184/SC5. 2003-04-03/04. Jeju, Republic of Korea. "SC 5 thanks Yasuyuki Nishioka, Hosei University and PSLX Consortium, for the presentation "Collaboration on Planning and Scheduling," explaining the activities of the PSLX Consortium. SC 5 invites Japan to develop a proposal to form a study group to investigate areas of the PSLX Consortium activity that can be standardized by SC 5. SC 5 further invites Japan to contact Korea and USA -- the two SC 5 members who have expressed potential interest in such a study group -- regarding their support and involvement..." Source: the SC5 web site. See the text of the presentation below.

An ad hoc meeting of SC5 was to be held in October 2003 discussing the PSLX specifications. The planners anticipate that an ISO DIS (Draft International Standard) for the PSLX Production Planning and Scheduling Model will be completed by April 2005. Meeting details: "Ad Hoc Meeting of ISO/TC 184/SC 5". October 30, 2003. Overview of PSLX and Relevant Documents: (1) PSLX-02 APS Agent Model; (2) PSLX-03 PSLX Domain Objects; (3) PSLX-04 XML Specification for PSLX. Discussion of Relationship of PSLX to: IEC 62264, Enterprise-control system integration; OMG CORBA Architecture; ISO 10746-2, 10746-3, Open Distributed Processing (ODP); ISO 13235, ODP Trading Function; ISO 14750, ODP Interface Definition Language (IDL); ISO 14753, ODP Interface References and Binding; ISO 14769, ODP Type Repository Function; ISO 14771, ODP Naming Framework; ISO 15415, OSP Reference Model - Enterprise Viewpoint; ISO 15704, Entreprise Reference Architecture and Methodology.

References:

PSLX Consortium

"The objective of the PSLX Consortium is to establish an APS (Advanced Planning and Scheduling) standard for collaborative Manufacturing and support world-wide manufacturers to implement our recommending APS systems... The PSLX consortium's new standard for production planning and scheduling is to be used in the Internet environment. PSLX will provide (1) a reference architecture for APS software development; (2) communication protocols and ontology suitable for APS software applications; (3) an XML Schema for planning and scheduling problems; (4) a common terminology for planning and scheduling problems..."

From "Collaborative Agents for Production Planning and Scheduling: A Challenge to Develop a New Software System Architecture for Manufacturing Management in Japan," presented by Prof. Dr. Yasuyuki Nishioka (Department of Industrial and Systems Management, Hosei University; Vice Chairman of PSLX Consortium, Japan)

"Manufacturers directly facing to unpredictable market demand should reduce their management risks using production planning and scheduling systems on the current ICT environment. Dealing with the production planning and scheduling problems that have many company specific capabilities especially in Japanese manufacturing industry, system development has to have many customizations. It is serious problem that these customized systems cannot follow the drastic change by reforming the old business processes. In the published recommendation specifications of the PSLX consortium, which has more than forty members of ICT and manufacturing industries in Japan, new software system architecture of production planning and scheduling problems is proposed. Since the proposed system allows different software packages perform independently, it can dynamically reform according to the market diversity. A XML based interface specification of PSLX is one of the keys to establish the communication among these autonomous subsystems. The recommendation also defines a domain object model that contains generic objects and relations in the planning and scheduling domain. If the domain object model is defined as a source of each company specific data schema, interoperability of the different systems will be established. The XML schema recommended by PSLX consortium is also one instance of the model. This generic model of PSLX will also contribute to the research community in this area as a bridge between academics and practitioners. In this talk, after brief introduction of the recommendation specification of PSLX, a next generation production management on collaborative agents for production planning and scheduling (CAPPS) is proposed. The CAPPS architecture has functional agents each of which has PSLX interface to communicate planning and scheduling information. The talk also shows some examples of common interface developed in several commercial based scheduling packages in Japan. Finally, the impact of CAPPS to manufacturing management and the importance of standardization of the domain model and its interface protocols are discussed..." [abtract from the August 2003 presentation at Blacksburg; see below]

References:

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