An Advanced Tool for Control System Design and Maintenance

The detailed engineering for control systems is usually supported by CAD Tools creating the relevant logic diagrams including software parameters and signal cross references. However at this stage of the design an early V and V process for checking out the functional correctness of the design is not available. The article describes the scope and capabilities of an advanced control system design tool which has the embedded capability of a stand-alone simulation of complex logic structures. The tool provides the following features for constructing logic diagrams for control systems: - Drag and Drop construction of logic diagrams using a predefined symbol sets; - Cross reference facility; - Data extraction facility; - Stand-alone simulation for Logic Diagrams featuring: On the fly changes, signal line animation, value boxes and mini trends etc. - Creation and on-line animation of Compound Objects (Handler); - Code Generation Facility for Simulation; - Code Generation Facility for several control systems. The results of the integrated simulation based V and V process can be used further for initial control system configuration and life cycle management as well as for Engineering Test Bed applications and finally in full Scope Replica Simulators for Operator Training. (authors)