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6 Information Infrastructure Issues
Pages 119-135

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From page 119...
... . A vision for the manufacturing enterprise of the 21st century includes the ability to use an integrated information system to support the entire product cycle from product design to product delivery to the end user.
From page 120...
... . Dynamic variations In agent autonomy Modeling and prototyping functions for user interfaces Next-generation data manipulation languages Maintenance of data consistency and integrity through database updates Network-based services for information browsing and searching Simplification of system designs, operation, and maintenance Self-healing systems Support for new programming paradigms Tools for component-based architecture life-cycle approaches General tools unconstrained by the limitations of specific programming languages Tools with aspects of knowledge-based collaboration software
From page 121...
... development Techniques for encapsulating legacy systems and developing mediator support Analysis methodologies, metrics, and selection techniques Reference architectures that cut across manufacturing domains to support software reusability Data representations that depict both spatial and temporal aspects Tools for better and more user-configurable user interfaces Dependable computing systems Collaboration technology Better technology to support changing software without removing a system from operation Continuous availability of on-line services Fault-tolerant hardware and software Increased system security and trustworthiness Software, user interfaces, and hardware to support cooperative work ligation into new information technology (IT) -enabled organizational forms is an area of research interest, as new organizational models will ultimately be needed, or earlier paradigms for understanding organizations revised, to better understand how activities might be reorganized to exploit information technology for better (or higher)
From page 122...
... Research is needed to develop better manufacturing architecture, standards, and interfaces, including research to develop standard equipment control architectures and generic functionality within the architectures, to support general manufacturing information standards, and to lower the cost of more open, less proprietary approaches. Especially desirable would be architectures whose standards accommodate some upgrade capability, so that technology vendors could worry less about premature freezing of technology and the locking out of poten ~ Wysk (1992)
From page 123...
... INTEGRATION Redesign of Business Practices Today, workers talking on the telephone, typing on keyboards, obtaining parts, scheduling factory operations, and setting up delivery schedules contribute much more to manufacturing costs than do the workers performing "touch labor."3 Lessons learned in both service and manufacturing industries attest to the value of systematic redesign of business practices and to the key role played by information technology and infrastructure in such reengineering.4 In particular, workers in a factory may be working very hard on an inappropriate set of tasks. They may be doing things that are not necessary, doing them inefficiently or even redundantly, or doing their work in such a way that it is not usable or accessible elsewhere.
From page 124...
... For example, using the manual and semiautomated manufacturing information systems of the past, integration was achieved through interactions between people where knowledge, data, and project status were shared through formal conversation in meetings and reviews and informal conversation in the hallways. Today, electronic mail, shared and remotely accessible databases, "groupware," and other forms of electronic communication present new options for centralizing and dispersing activities and also for supporting cross-functional teams and processes.
From page 125...
... Databases and database management systems, equipment control systems, communications systems, and design support tools all present a multifaceted challenge to achieving interoperability. Meeting that challenge requires a deep understanding of underlying data constructs, the operations that constitute the relevant manipulations, and the assumptions behind various operations and calculations.5 While now readily available in certain domains (e.g., the representa 5 For example, Defense Department officials tell a Gulf War story regarding an inquiry about the number of MREs (Meals, Ready to Eat)
From page 126...
... Commercial interests play a key role as well. Vendors have often chosen to develop products with proprietary interfaces and data representations.
From page 127...
... Such connection is necessary, for example, to link flexible manufacturing 6 Internally developed integrated information technology solutions are always possible in principle. But as a practical matter, only the very largest firms have the resources to develop even partial information technology solutions in-house, and essentially no firm can do it all alone.
From page 128...
... Since there is increasing demand for the ability to transmit control messages on existing open communications networks, research is needed to formulate the principles for construction and operation of networks that support time-critical message delivery in a context of interconnecting, multipurpose networks. If possible, such systems should be compatible and interoperable with other time-critical and non-time-critical applications and communications; in this event, they could be made compatible with a wide range of TCP/IP products.
From page 129...
... along with the movement of goods, information must move up and down the supply chain. Information technology can facilitate the passage of information within a manufacturing enterprise, but as importantly, it can enable different organizational structures and relationships among various elements in the supply chain, and networked infrastructures can extend well beyond a firm's boundaries.
From page 130...
... NON-MANUFACTURING-SPECIFIC RESEARCH Given that manufacturing operations are typically large and complex, it is not surprising that the software for controlling and managing such operations is also large and complex. Research in many traditional areas of computer science, including information retrieval, software engineering, and reliable computing, as well as in collaboration technology, will be relevant to manufacturing.
From page 131...
... Manufacturing data, especially data related to geometry, are instead associative. Consequently, using current data manipulation languages for manufacturing data is counter-intuitive and difficult.
From page 132...
... Thus, while network tools such as gophers, MOSAIC, and Wide-Area Information Search systems are promising starts to the general problem, research is needed to develop more advanced automated tools that accept information on needed parts or processes as input, search or make appropriate inquiries at appropriate sites on the NII, and return to the user a list of those sites and the information found there. Such an effort would also depend on new indexing schemes and data representations that would allow semantically driven searches of both text and nontext information.
From page 133...
... · Programming paradigms that enable manufacturing personnel, rather than software development experts, to develop and change application systems for the shop floor or the design laboratory. This capability will require better methods of developing software and better human-machine interfaces to enable domain-specific software specification.
From page 134...
... · Software reuse. The ability to reuse software and system artifacts and results from associated analyses in the development of new systems or applications would leverage previous investments in expertise, effort, money, and time.
From page 135...
... Collaboration Technology and Computer-supported Cooperative Work The trend toward organizing workers of all kinds into teams with significant levels of decision-making authority gives rise to a need for technology to support collaborative activity. For example, intelligent systems are needed to support collaborative efforts in the design of complex products; they can also facilitate collaboration among factory and other, nonproduction personnel.


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