Decomposition of first-order hybrid Petri nets for hierarchical control of manufacturing systems

Although hybrid Petri net (HPN) is a popular formalism in modelling hybrid production systems, the HPN model of large scale systems gets substantially complicated for analysis and control due to large dimensionality of such systems. To overcome this problem, a typical approach is to decompose the net into subnets and then control the plant through hierarchical or decentralized structures. Although this concept has been widely discussed in the literature for discrete PNs, there is a lack of research for HPNs. In this paper, a new method of decomposition of first-order hybrid Petri nets (FOHPNs) is proposed first and then the hierarchical control of the subnets through a coordinator is introduced. The advantage of using the proposed approach is validated by an existing example. A sugar milling case study is analysed by using a decomposed FOHPN model and the optimization results are compared against the results of the approaches presented in other papers. Simulation results show not only an improvement in production rate, but also show the ability to control the plant online. In addition, by using the hierarchical control structure for an FOHPN model, it is possible to reduce the cost of communication links, improve the reliability of the system, maintain the plant locally, and partially redesign the system.     

Model repair — aligning process models to reality

Process mining techniques relate observed behavior (i.e., event logs) to modeled behavior (e.g., a BPMN model or a Petri net). Process models can be discovered from event logs and conformance checking techniques can be used to detect and diagnose differences between observed and modeled behavior. Existing process mining techniques can only uncover these differences, but the actual repair of the model is left to the user and is not supported. In this paper we investigate the problem of repairing a process model w.r.t. a log such that the resulting model can replay the log (i.e., conforms to it) and is as similar as possible to the original model. To solve the problem, we use an existing conformance checker that aligns the runs of the given process model to the traces in the log. Based on this information, we decompose the log into several sublogs of non-fitting subtraces. For each sublog, either a loop is discovered that can replay the sublog or a subprocess is derived that is then added to the original model at the appropriate location. The approach is implemented in the process mining toolkit ProM and has been validated on logs and models from several Dutch municipalities.     

A Reduced Reachability Tree for a Class of Unbounded Petri Nets

As a powerful analysis tool of Petri nets, reachability trees are fundamental for systematically investigating many characteristics such as boundedness, liveness and reversibility. This work proposes a method to generate a reachability tree, called ωRT for short, for a class of unbounded generalized nets called ω-independent nets based on new modified reachability trees (NMRTs). ωRT can effectively decrease the number of nodes by removing duplicate and ω-duplicate nodes in the tree, and verify properties such as reachability, liveness and deadlocks. Two examples are provided to show its superiority over NMRTs in terms of tree size.      

The implementation of a smartphone-based fall detection system using a high-level fuzzy Petri net

The falling down problem has become one of the very important issues of global public health in an aging society. The specific equipment was adopted as the detection device of falling-down in the early studies, but it is inconvenient for the elderly and difficult for future application. The smart phone more commonly used than the specific fall detection equipment is selected as a mobile device for human fall detection, and a fall detection algorithm is developed for this purpose. What the user has to do is to put the smart phone in his/her thigh pocket for falling down detection. The signals detected by the tri-axial G-sensor are converted into signal vector magnitudes as the basis of detecting a human body in a stalling condition. The Z-axis data sets are captured for identification of human body inclination and the occurrence frequencies at the peak of the area of use are used as the input parameters. A high-level fuzzy Petri net is used for the analysis and the development of identifying human actions, including normal action, exercising, and falling down. The results of this study can be used in the relevant equipments or in the field of home nursing.     

Petri网在计算机网络实时性分析中的应用

计算机网络实时性分析问题一直是国内外各知名院校、研究机构的研究重点之一。Petri网是一种可以描述系统动态行为特性的图形化建模工具,直观形象,易于学习和理解,便于使用。为此,在给出Petri网基本介绍的基础上,探讨了Petri网在计算机网络实时性分析中的应用价值。     

网络管理中事件关联检测机制的研究

网络事件的关联检测是网络管理需要解决的一个关键问题,本文根据分布式网络管理的特点,首次明确定义了网络事件的基本关联关系,在此基础上提出了一种基于Petri Net的事件关联检测机制,实现了基于事件内容的细粒度关联检测,并且在事件检测中充分考虑了时间因素,有效地提高了事件关联检测的准确性。     

Efficient simulation of hierarchical stochastic activity network models

Stochastic extensions to Petri nets have gained widespread acceptance as a method for describing the dynamic behavior of discrete-event systems. Both simulation and analytic methods have been proposed to solve such models. This paper describes a set of efficient procedures for simulating models that are represented as stochastic activity networks (SANs, a variant of stochastic Petri nets) and composed SAN-based reward models (SBRMs). Composed SBRMs are a hierarchical representation for SANs, in which individual SAN models can be replicated and joined together with other models, in an iterative fashion. The procedures exploit the hierarchical structure and symmetries introduced by the replicate operation in a composed SBRM to reduce the cost of future event list management. The procedures have been implemented as part of a larger performance-dependability modeling package known asUltraSAN, and have been applied to real, large-scale applications. This work was supported in part by the Digital Equipment Corporation Faculty Program: Incentives for Excellence.     

基于Remoting的设备能力导航的工艺规划调度系统设计与实现

为克服传统工艺规划系统与生产调度系统分开单独设计的缺点，用Remoting技术及“面向接口编程”的思想，设计了多层分布式的基于设备能力导航的工艺规划与调度系统。系统在进行工艺规划与生产调度时，均实时采集设备的当前负荷状况，在保证交货期的前提下，确定出零件工艺与机床设备的匹配方案。将该方案用于设计能保证各机床设备之间的能力基本平衡。     

济钢中厚板厂3500mm精轧机快速换辊自控系统

中厚板厂3500mm精轧机快速换辊自控系统，集可编程序控制器、变频传动技术、液压控制于一体。实现了工作辊、支承辊准确、快速地更换。通过网络技术与其他控制系统进行数据交换、操作及连锁，使轧制生产线实现了全自动化轧制，不仅改善了工人的劳动强度，还提高了产品的产量及质量，取得了巨大的社会效益及经济效益。     

Analysis of the Datagram Congestion Control Protocol’s connection management procedures using the sweep-line method

State space explosion is a key problem in the analysis of finite state systems. The sweep-line method is a state exploration method which uses a notion of progress to allow states to be deleted from memory when they are no longer required. This reduces the peak number of states that need to be stored, while still exploring the full state space. The technique shows promise but has never achieved reductions greater than about a factor of 10 in the number of states stored in memory for industrially relevant examples. This paper discusses sweep-line analysis of the connection management procedures of a new Internet standard, the Datagram Congestion Control Protocol (DCCP). As the intuitive approaches to sweep-line analysis are not effective, we introduce new variables to track progress. This creates further state explosion. However, when used with the sweep-line, the peak number of states is reduced by over two orders of magnitude compared with the original. Importantly, this allows DCCP to be analysed for larger parameter values. Somsak Vanit-Anunchai was partially supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant (DP0559927) and Suranaree University of Technology. Guy Edward Gallasch was supported by an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant (DP0559927).