AN ARCHITECTURE FOR INTEGRATED AUTOMATED QUALITY-CONTROL

Total quality management for the product lifecycle requires integratin g quality control systems with product development, production, and su pport systems. Integrating automated inspection with advanced computer manufacturing systems components greatly enhances the improvement of products and processes. Presented is an approach to integrate inspecti on systems with automated manufacturing systems. This step completes t he computer-integrated manufacturing loop. Described is an architectur e to integrate quality considerations with conventional product charac teristics. Elements of an operational environment for this approach ar e described, along with a framework and functional components that fit in the framework. The framework and the functional components form an architecture called the Expert Programming System-One (EPS-1). An exa mple illustrates the operation and functioning characteristics of the EPS-1.