Field device specification for the development of function block oriented engineering support systems

The function block (FB) concept is proposed by evolving standards to address most of the problems encountered in the development process of distributed industrial process measurement and control systems (IPMCS) applications. To increase modularity, reliability and expandability of FB-based IPMCS applications as well as to automate the development process and increase reusability, new generation FB-oriented engineering support systems (ESS), are highly required. These ESSs should be able to exploit FBs provided by intelligent field devices, which are expected to appear in the market in the near future, and also assign functionality to the great number of different field devices that already exist in the market. A common field device model is strongly required to accomplish both the above tasks. In the context of this work, we consider the requirements for the field device model imposed both by the development of the FB-oriented ESSs and the demand for device interoperability during the fieldbus operation phase. We use the Unified Modelling Language (UML) to proceed to the definition of the field device model. This model, combined with our 4-layer IPMCS architecture, constitutes a framework that facilitates the development of open FB-oriented ESSs.