Scalable integration: from enterprise information management to real time process control using the metadatabase model

Integration in today's industrial enterprises requires an information technology that is scalable and adaptable. In particular, the technology must: 1) allow for multiple data and knowledge systems interoperating over distributed, heterogeneous, and concurrent environments; (2) support a hierarchy of functions ranging from shop floor processing systems all the way up to enterprise managerial systems; and (3) provide a core software paradigm capable of information management and real-time control of physical processes for comprehensive configuration and integration. Most of the integration technologies available now do not possess such scalability and adaptability. In this research, we extend the metadatabase model, which promises the properties of (1) and (2) mentioned above, with a core software paradigm to effect the third. In particular, the work develops a new real time rule-oriented programming environment capable of integration in both physical processes control and database processing environments