COMPUTER-ASSISTED CONFIGURATION OF A TECHNICAL SYSTEM

Abstract

The invention specifies a computerized method for configuring a technical system comprising a sequence (Pi) of system components (Si), whereby each sequence (Pi) of system components (Si) can be assigned to a sequence pattern and whereby the sequence comprises at least one system component (Si), whereby the method comprises the following steps: specifying a support threshold for sequence patterns (M1) by a user, starting the configuration of the technical system (M2) by choosing a sequence of system components (Si) by the user (U), analysing (M3) the chosen sequence (Pi) of system components (Si) and extracting sequence patterns by an automation unit (A), and introducing (M4) at least one further system component (Si) based on the extracted sequence pattern and according to the support threshold by the automation unit (A). The invention further specifies a computer program product and a computer-readable storage medium.

Claims

1. A computerized method for configuring a technical system comprising a sequence of system components, wherein the sequence of system components is assignable to a sequence pattern, and wherein the sequence of system components comprises at least one system component, the method comprising: specifying a support threshold for sequence patterns by a user; starting a configuration of the technical system, the starting of the configuration of the technical system comprising choosing the sequence of system components by the user, wherein at least one equivalence relation function between sequence patterns is specified by the user before starting the configuration of the technical system, and wherein the at least one equivalence relation function specification is configured to request at least one equal first system component directly or non-directly followed by at least one equal second system component for sequence patterns to be equal; analyzing the chosen sequence of system components and extracting sequence patterns by an automation unit, wherein analyzing the chosen sequence of system components includes a pattern mining procedure; and introducing at least one further system component to the chosen sequence of system components based on the extracted sequence pattern and according to the support threshold by the automation unit, wherein the automation unit is trained by: configuring the technical system, configuring the technical system comprising choosing the sequence of system components by the user; storing the chosen sequence of system components in a database; and training the automation unit using the sequence of system components stored in the database.

2. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the system components include technical operations, hardware units, or technical operations and hardware units.

3. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the support threshold of a sequence pattern is a value that indicates how frequent a sequence pattern must be in the database for the automation unit to introduce the at least one further system component based on the analyzed sequence pattern.

4. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the sequence pattern describes a series of successive system components.

5. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the database is organized in the form of a search tree.

6. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the database stores the sequence of system components of one user or of multiple users.

7. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the technical system is an engineering system, an automatization system, a production system, an industrial system, or any combination thereof, includes a technical project on the technical system, or a combination thereof.

8. (canceled)

9. In a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that stores instructions executable by a computational device to configure a technical system comprising a sequence of system components, wherein the sequence of system components is assignable to a sequence pattern, and wherein the sequence of system components comprises at least one system component, the instructions comprising: specifying a support threshold for sequence patterns by a user; starting a configuration of the technical system, the starting of the configuration of the technical system comprising choosing the sequence of system components by the user, wherein at least one equivalence relation function between sequence patterns is specified by the user before starting the configuration of the technical system, and wherein the at least one equivalence relation function specification is configured to request at least one equal first system component directly or non-directly followed by at least one equal second system component for sequence patterns to be equal; analyzing the chosen sequence of system components and extracting sequence patterns by an automation unit, wherein analyzing the chosen sequence of system components includes a pattern mining procedure; and introducing at least one further system component to the chosen sequence of system components based on the extracted sequence pattern and according to the support threshold by the automation unit, wherein the automation unit is trained by: configuring the technical system, configuring the technical system comprising choosing the sequence of system components by the user; storing the chosen sequence of system components in a database; and training the automation unit using the sequence of system components stored in the database.

10. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the system components include technical operations, hardware units, or technical operations and hardware units.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the support threshold of a sequence pattern is a value that indicates how frequent a sequence pattern must be in the database for the automation unit to introduce the at least one further system component based on the analyzed sequence pattern.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the sequence pattern describes a series of successive system components.

13. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the database is organized in the form of a search tree.

14. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the database stores the sequence of system components of one user or of multiple users.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the technical system is an engineering system, an automatization system, a production system, an industrial system, or any combination thereof, includes a technical project on the technical system, or a combination thereof.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0043] FIG. 1 shows a flow diagram of the purposed method,

[0044] FIG. 2 shows sequences of system components,

[0045] FIG. 3 shows a trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification,

[0046] FIG. 4 shows a non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification,

[0047] FIG. 5 shows a search tree resulting from sequence pattern mining, and

[0048] FIG. 6 shows the overall workflow of the proposed method.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0049] FIG. 1 shows a flow diagram of the purposed computerized method for configuring a technical system comprising a sequence of system components, whereby each sequence of system components of system components can be assigned to a sequence pattern and whereby the sequence comprises at least one system component.

[0050] The method comprises the following steps: [0051] Method step M1: specifying a support threshold for sequence patterns and optionally at least one equivalence relation function between sequence patterns by a user, [0052] Method step M2: starting the configuration of the technical system by choosing the sequence of system components by the user, [0053] Method step M3: analysing the chosen sequence of system components and extracting sequence patterns by an automation unit, whereby analysing (M3) the chosen sequence of system components includes a pattern mining procedure and [0054] Method step M4: introducing at least one further system component based on the extracted sequence pattern and according to the support threshold (and the optional equivalence relation function) by the automation unit.

[0055] Every project of configuring a technical system can be represented as a sequence of operations performed consecutively/sequences of system components P1, P2, and P3 chosen by a user (see FIG. 2).

[0056] FIG. 2 shows exemplary sequences of system components P1, P2, and P3 chosen by a user, e.g. an engineer in the process of configuring an engineering project. Each sequences of system components P1, P2, and P3 has multiple system components S1 to S9. The shadings of the circles indicate the type of the system component/action that the user chooses.

[0057] FIG. 3 shows a trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification T. The trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification T requests exact equivalence of the sequence of system components for sequence patterns to be equal. This means a trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification T requests a common first system component directly followed by a common second system component for sequence patterns to be equal. System component in between of the first system component and the second system component are not allowed. The trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification T can be used as default.

[0058] FIG. 4 shows a non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification NT. The non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification NT requests at least one equal first system component (shaded with “−” in the example of FIG. 4) directly or non-directly followed by at least one equal second system component (shaded with “+” in the example of FIG. 4) for sequence patterns to be equal.

[0059] In the example of FIG. 4, the user wants all sequence patterns that start with the specified first system component and end with the specified second system component steps to be equivalent in case they are separated by not more than 1 other system component. A support threshold is a value that indicates how frequent a sequence pattern must be in a project database that an automation unit introduce a system component based on a sequence pattern analysed. For example, the support measure (measure to be compared with the support threshold) of the pattern shown in FIG. 3 (shaded with “−”.fwdarw.shaded with “+”) is one third in the project database depicted in FIG. 2 if the user chooses the trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification T (FIG. 3). However, if the user chooses the non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification NT (FIG. 4), then the support measure of this pattern is 1.

[0060] FIG. 5 shows a search tree ST resulting from sequence pattern mining on a collection of configurations of technical systems (projects) in the database DB. The search tree has multiple layers Ll to L3. Each further layer includes one further system component.

[0061] The method of the invention monitors the sequence of operations performed consecutively/sequences of system components chosen by a user in the engineering software/tools and actively maintains the search tree ST. The search tree ST keeps all discovered sequence patterns and their current support measures (measure to be compared with the support threshold). In case the user creates a new engineering project for a new technical system, the method of the invention will not re-calculate the whole search tree ST from scratch, but it will rather update the existing search tree ST. Update of the search tree ST includes re-calculation of support measures for sequence patterns already in the search tree ST as well as further growth of the search tree ST. Depending on the choice of the equivalence relation function, the search tree ST might look differently. For example, if the user chooses the trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification (FIG. 3), then e.g. the right pattern in layer 2 L2 and the right pattern in layer 3 L3 in FIG. 5 will be treated as separate by the method of the invention. However, if the user chooses the non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification (FIG. 4), the method of the invention will not include sequence the right pattern in layer 3 L3 in the search tree ST, since it is equivalent to the right pattern in layer 2 L2.

[0062] FIG. 6 shows the overall workflow of the training within the proposed method. A user U works with an engineering software ES. The user U choses/defines a new sequences of system components P/new project for a new technical system. The chosen sequence of system components P is stored in a database DB. The database DB is used to train an automation unit A in a “training gym” (=training algorithm) G. The trained automation unit A is used afterwards from the engineering software ES to support the user U with configuring technical systems.

LIST OF REFERENCE SIGNS

[0063] A automation unit [0064] DB database [0065] ES Engineering software [0066] G Training gym [0067] Li layer i (i ∈ [1; 3]) [0068] Mi Method step i (i ∈ [1; 5]) [0069] NT non-trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification [0070] Si system component i (i ∈ [1; 9]) [0071] ST search tree [0072] T trivial sequence pattern equivalence relation function specification [0073] U user [0074] P new sequences of system components/new project for a new technical system [0075] Pi sequences of system components i (i ∈ [1; 3])