STRUCTURED REPRESENTATION OF RULE-BASED SPECIFICATIONS IN CIM USING UPDATED PETRI NETS

A graphical representation tool-updated Petri nets (UPN)-has been deve loped to model rule-base specifications for CIM databases. UPN facilit ates the modeling of relationships between operations of various manuf acturing application systems and the database updates and retrievals a mong all the respective distributed databases. Based on this represent ation, a hierarchical modeling technique which includes refining and a ggregating rules has also been developed. An application of the UPN is demonstrated in designing rule-based systems for controlling and inte grating the information flow between manufacturing applications, inclu ding computer aided design, computer aided process planning, manufactu ring resources planning, and shop floor control.