Fwd: Process Specification Language (PSL)
Bryan Bishop
http://www.nist.gov/msidlibrary/doc/nistir6459.pdf
Main site: http://www.mel.nist.gov/psl/
"The Process Specification Language (PSL) defines a neutral
representation for manufacturing processes that supports automated
reasoning. Process data is used throughout the life cycle of a
product, from early indications of manufacturing process flagged
during design, through process planning, validation, production
scheduling and control. In addition, the notion of process also
underlies the entire manufacturing cycle, coordinating the workflow
within engineering and shop floor manufacturing."
Somewhat related, short bunch of slides,
"XML for manufacturing systems integration"
http://www.mel.nist.gov/msid/sima/item2000/b10rhodes.pdf
Don't know if I mentioned those here before.
Pouchard, L., et. al. "Ontology Engineering for Distributed
Collaboration in Manufacturing," to appear in the Proceedings of the
AIS2000 conference, March 2000.
http://www.nist.gov/msidlibrary/doc/AISfinal2.pdf
"Many applications use process information, including production
scheduling, process planning, workflow, business process
reengineering, simulation, process realization process modeling, and
project management. There are at least two problems with the way all
applications typically represent process information:
They use their own internal representations, therefore communication
between them, a growing need for industry, is nearly impossible
without some kind of translator.
The meaning of the representation is captured informally, in
documentation and example, so little automated assistance can be given
to the process designer.
The goals of PSL are to create a process representation that:
is common to all manufacturing applications, generic enough to be
decoupled from any given application, and robust enough to represent
the necessary process information for any given application.
addresses the "runtime" level of processes, to capture the intended
effect of process languages in a computer-manipulable way.
The benefits of the representation are:
Facilitating communication between the various applications because
they would all "speak the same language." Companies and departments
are not constrained to using the same or similar software packages, or
introduce a new learning curve to one of the organizations that
possibly does not have that package. The companies can use their
native software package that are "PSL compliant" and then export files
in the common representation to be read by the partner company.
Providing automated assistance for process development by defining the
semantics of process languages in a computer-manipulable way. For
example, many businesses have rules and policies that their processes
are supposed to follow. However, the representation of these typically
do not enable tools to check whether they are consistent. PSL
represents rules about processes in the same way as the processes
themselves, and uses a formalism that supports automated reasoning.
Tools can translate business rules and processes to PSL to check where
business processes are not following policies and rules."
Quick examples:
(forall (?r)
(=> (inject_mold)
(resourceA ?r)))
Or:
(forall (?r ?a)
(<=> (resourceA ?r)
(exists (?a)
(reusable ?r ?a)))
Don't ask me what they mean. I can't seem to find sufficiently
annotated examples of PSL. Maybe this is common of ISO standards (this
one is #18629). Hrm.
marc fawzi
everything in computational reality is a process
can this process language describe its own model?
Paul D. Fernhout
http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/search?group=openmanufacturing&q=psl&qt_g=Search+this+group
Especially:
"Manufacturing standards and metadata (was Re: thingiverse)"
http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/0d05ac059bc75539
"""
As far as there being an organization that is mandated to do standards about
manufacturing in the USA, NIST (National Institute of Standards and
Technology) has done some work on this:
http://www.mel.nist.gov/psl/
"The Process Specification Language (PSL) defines a neutral representation
for manufacturing processes that supports automated reasoning. Process data
is used throughout the life cycle of a product, from early indications of
manufacturing process flagged during design, through process planning,
validation, production scheduling and control. In addition, the notion of
process also underlies the entire manufacturing cycle, coordinating the
workflow within engineering and shop floor manufacturing."
But I don't really understand their work yet in detail (just not enough
time). It seems like there is a lot of abstraction, but I've been on their
mailing list for years and not seen much activity (or maybe I dropped of it
somehow?). They also list related projects with links:
http://www.mel.nist.gov/psl/projects.html
"""
* EPFL Timed Multi-Level Petri Nets for Integrated Process and Job Shop
Production Planning
* <I-N-OVA> (Constraint Model of Activity)
* IP3S (Integrated Process Planning/Production Scheduling)
* IPPD (Shared Integrated Product/Process Development)
* IPPI (Integrated Product Processing Initiative)
* JTF Core Plan Representation
* MSD (Manufacturing Simulation Driver) project
* Oak Ridge National Laboratories (ORNL)
* Ontology.org
* PIF (Process Interchange Format)
* SPAR - Shared Planning and Activity Representation
* TOVE (Toronto Virtual Enterprise)
* WfMC (Workflow Management Coalition)
"""
(I tried four at random and the links were all broken. :-( )
From the following link,
http://www.mel.nist.gov/psl/people.html
it seems that NIST has got one or two people working on PSL now, which seems
pitiful for something that could transform how trillions of dollars of
business are done annually -- but that's really Congress' fault, if
anyone's. And as the PSL group says on their site:
http://www.mel.nist.gov/psl/yourrole.html
"The reader is encouraged to play an integral role in the definition of the
Process Specification Language by providing comments and suggestions as the
project progresses. It is our intention to create this language to suit the
needs and desires of you, our consumer. We can only do this with your
feedback."
"""
--Paul Fernhout
marc fawzi
It sounds as if "open manufacturing" really has little to do with the narrow definition of 'manufacturing' and everything to do with PEER PRODUCTION, where 'peer' can be anything from molecular robots to Bryan himself ;)
I'm impressed with the narrow scoping the title of this group implies relative to what it means... It keeps people who are interested in anything and everything out and brings in people who are genuinely interested in the term manufacturing in its narrow scope, but it does not seem to be working :) Despite the title having a very narrow scope (for people who associate manufacturing with conventional factories rather than with peer production of any scale) I see a lot of people here, myself included, who are interested in anything and everything to do with 'production'
I wonder what effect it would have on the size of this group if the group's title was Open Production rather than Open Manufacturing
Paul D. Fernhout
> I wonder what effect it would have on the size of this group
> if the group's title was Open Production rather than Open Manufacturing
To answer your question in part, here is another group with "production" in
the title Nathan started (before this one) with only three posts:
http://groups.google.com/group/mutually-assured-production
"We discuss a strategic outline for implementing open manufacturing and
distribution techniques. We work with currently existing proprietary
infrastructures to create an Open Society."
That seems to have not caught on as well for some reason, even when
advocated by the same person who started this open manufacturing group.
Se also:
"Mutually Assured Production for Universal Well Being: A Brief
Introductory Discussion" by Nathan Cravens
http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/2514/
"Just as technology has the capacity to create, it can also destroy. It is
crucial lived concepts like scarcity is identified so a life of abundance
can fill destructive voids left behind. With enough collaborative expertise
drawn to conclude that “giving gives more giving” and that “taking takes
more taking,” the capacity to harmonize between these spheres can ensure
that all of us have greater potential to live more preferred lives while
limiting the causes of harm to oneself and others. "
Also:
http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Mutually_Assured_Production
I'm sure Nathan might have more to say about this issue of what is in a
name, having tried at least two. :-)
For me, "production" is just too general a term (people produce movies, web
sites, documents), and while I'd like to see those be free and open too,
there are a lot of other places to discuss that, so that is why
"manufacturing", which in English has more connotations of physicality,
seems a better fit. But "production line" is a common term in industry, so
it's still no that bad a choice.
"Open Industry" could be another. Or, as a third name Nathan has worked on
here, "Open Enterprise". But again, between those two, in English, industry
seems more physical, whereas enterprise could include any company selling
services or software or media content. While people use industry in various
ways (the media industry), by itself it seems to feel more physical to me.
However, in that case, since Nathan is looking at a broader set of societal
issues, the broader enterprise might indeed be the better term.
People can use WordNet to look up the way that words in English relate to
each other, and how inclusive or exclusive they are:
http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
Example for "industry":
http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?o2=&o0=1&o7=&o5=&o1=1&o6=&o4=&o3=&s=industry&i=13&h=011000100001000#c
You can see there the close relation (derivatinoally related form) of
industry and manufacture.
Of course WordNet there is just for the English language. In other
languages, other words might be better. For example, in other languages
free-as-in-freedom and free-as-is-beer are often separate (libre vs.
gratis), which has caused no end of trouble for the "Free Sofware" movement.
:-( That is why "open source" showed up as a term, but it has its own
problems, since you can sometimes look at the source of something but have
no rights to change it. In fact, from the idea of "contamination", you may
be worse off legally from having been exposed to the open source of a
proprietary product if you want to make a similar free-as-in-freedom thing.
That may be one reason Microsoft is trying to get as many people as it can
in academia to see part of its source code (but under restrictive licenses)
-- to contaminate all these students legally and make any future work they
do on free stuff always be under a legal cloud.
--Paul Fernhout
marc fawzi
To me, what is "good" is a non-computable judgment ;) Excuse my overuse of this concept but now I have up to 10 words listed under non-computable judgments
So in my view it would be useless for me to think/compute what makes "open manufacturing" a good title vs "open production"
But I could be confusing 'good' with 'attracting' ... in other words, the phrase 'open manufacturing' may trigger/relate to a certain archetype in our psyche, probably having to do with our biology.. is the biological cell a factory? does it manufacture stuff? and in the 'fractal spiral' model of reality are we our cells? In other words, I am suggesting the Jungian concept of an archetypal attractor which is computable, before elevating the problem to good vs bad
Yikes.
I need to get out more often.