Component Test – Test Strategies with Asset Administration Shells

Quality assurance of automation components and their functionality has become increasingly important in a world of ever-changing requirements that can only be met by autonomous and flexible production plants. In this paper, existing solutions for the automation of industrial test processes are discussed and their transferability to Asset Administration Shells (AAS) is presented. The necessary components for integrating Asset Administration Shells in an Industry 4.0 test environment are shown. Furthermore, two strategies for conducting tests are explained. While the first test strategy assumes the existence of a registry component (here from the BaSyx middleware), the second approach is based on the use of a ticket system. Any Industry 4.0 component represented by a passive or reactive AAS can be considered a test object. Depending on the chosen strategy, test recipes are provided as descriptors either by the user or the test object itself, respectively.