Architecture design for distributed process planning

Today's machining shop floors, characterized by a large variety of products in small batch sizes, require dynamic process planning capabilities that are responsive and adaptive to the rapid changes of production capacity and functionality. To meet the requirement, this research proposes a new methodology for dynamic and distributed process planning. The primary focus of this paper is on the architecture of a new approach using function blocks. The secondary focus is given to the other supporting technologies-machining features and agents. Different from conventional methods, this approach uses a two-layer structure-supervisory planning and operation planning. It is expected that the new architecture can improve the system performance in a dynamic environment.