Functions of a manufacturing workstation controller

This paper details the functions of a generic manufacturing workstation controller in the context of a computer integrated manufacturing (CIM) system. For each of these functions the required software and hardware performance characteristics are assessed. A brief overview of CIM is presented followed by a discussion of manufacturing workstations. The functions presented and described are task decomposition, inventory management, monitoring and control, reporting and communications. The performance attributes are presented using a qualitative scale. In software they include several characteristics of the operating system, application development potential, and communications support. The hardware attributes are discussed in terms of modularity of architecture, computing speed, memory requirements, I/O, interrupt structure, network support, remote unit support and environmental features. The results are concisely presented on two qualitative assessment matrices which match functions with performance attributes. Details supporting these assessments are presented in the text.