Web based IOPT Petri net Editor with an extensible plugin architecture to support generic net operations

This paper presents a new Web based Petri net Editor employing AJAX principles to allow the interactive design and edition of Petri net models using standard Web browsers. The editor includes an integrated plug-in architecture to simplify the addition of generic net operations without requiring the manipulation of internal editor data-structures. IOPT-nets are a non-autonomous Petri net class targeting the model-based development of embedded system controllers and combine the well know properties of Petri nets with input and output signals and events to establish the communication of controllers with the external world. The editor is a part of the IOPT-tools Web service that also contains model-checking and automatic code-generation tools, supporting a complete model-based development work-flow, starting from model design to the final controller code generation. All tools are available at the research group Web page (http://gres.uninova.pt).