Performance evaluation of real-time decision making architectures for computer integrated manufacturing systems

摘要

Computer Integrated Manufacturing (CIM) systems are interdisciplinary in nature and are heavily dependent on the acquisition, transmission, and processing of data, information, and knowledge. The efficient implementation of CIM requires the development of an integrated model of the overall system architecture and its control, communication, and database functions. In its 'Research Agenda for CIM: Information Technology', the Panel on Technical Barriers to Computer Integrated Manufacturing states that the 'Overall architecture for CIM deals with the basic question of how a large CIM system can be designed, developed, and modified in an orderly fashion ... Common practice at the earliest states of designing CIM systems is to make almost arbitrary decisions regarding hierarchical levels, the amount of central processing unit power and storage at each node, interconnection topology...'. Designers of these architectures follow ad-hoc procedures requiring considerable amounts of experience, ingenuity, and insight. Therefore, there is a great need to develop a modeling methodology to aid in the design and performance evaluation of such architectures for CIM systems. In this work, real-time Decision Making Architectures for CIM systems are modeled and evaluated. Although the accuracy of the decisions is very important, only the timeliness of the decisions is examined here.