Service-orientation on behalf of self-configuration for the automation environment

On current automation systems a device failure might lead to significant down times of a plant as well as man power to replace and - more important - to setup the replacement device. Since the physical replacement can't be circumvented, the setup procedure could be automatized as much as possible. This paper shows an approach based on a new automation system designed as a service-oriented architecture (SOA). Advantages of this service-orientation for the automation environment are described in detail. The presented choreography of services yields to a flexible, dynamic and scalable system like it is well known for today's distributed, information technology systems - e.g. grid computing. This approach is applied to the self-configuration scenario as a demonstration of the benefits and chances, which could be achieved by modeling automation systems based on the SOA principle. A prototype realizes the presented service-choreography using real-world's automation components.