Towards a platform for simulating the state-driven real-time control of a flexible manufacturing cell

Starting from a discrete-event model of a flexible manufacturing system, the authors propose a simulation platform for developing and testing real-time control algorithms intended to exploit the flexibility factors of a manufacturing cell. Such a platform allows the specification of the cell components, i.e the configurations, the working procedures, and the production profile. It is built on three major blocks, namely, the database supporting the state and production knowledge, the transition rules directing the cell evolution, and the algorithms choosing the state trajectory. The database description is approached through the entity-relationship technique