Without considering the details about each activity, theproviding-receiving service relationship can be represented by flow model which is realized by the toplevel net of HCPNs depicted
Trang 1A service is well defined in a framework consisting of a service provider, a service receiver, servicecontents, and service channels A service model consisting of three sub-models: scope model, viewmodel and flow model, is also presented A computer-aided design tool, called Service Explorer, isdeveloped to represent a network of the parameters and determines the influence weight one another
(Shimomura Y., et al 2003).
In this paper, we present a research framework for service engineering based on a kind of high-levelPetri Nets—Hierarchical Colored Petri Nets (Jensen Kurt, 2004) Firstly we give the flow model intop level net to describe the structure of a target service as a chain of agents existing in the service.Then the sub pages corresponding to the substitution transitions of the top level net give the scopemodels determining the sub services which include each agent as a receiver Moreover, there are alsosubstitution transitions in the scope model, the sub pages corresponding to them give the view modelsexpressing the relationships among the RSPs (Receiver State Parameters), CoPs (Content Parameters),and ChPs (Channel Parameters) Under this framework, we can represent material flow information,also deal with RSPs It will be helpful in intensifying, improving, and automating the whole service,including service creation, service delivery, and service consumption We illustrate the developmentprocedure by studying Consumer Electronics Rental Service using CPN—TOOLS software
2 THE WHOLE STRUCTURE OF PRODUCING-CONSUMING SYSTEM AND THE TOP LEVELPETRI NET
By "leasing" instead of "selling", Consumer Electronics Rental Service can realize a new paradigmfrom product-selling to function-selling: reducing of cost and trouble of customers (buying, operation,disposal), following customers' situation changes, taking back and renting again, tiding-up with houseleasing service with little customization instead of new needs for high functionalities
The process from producing to consuming is a complicated and large system, obviously it is better todescribe it using hierarchical and modular method in order to analyze it clearly We will deal with itunder the 3 sub-model framework and give a realization using Hierarchical Colored Petri nets.Between the electronic producer (the service provider) and the consumers (the service receivers), thereare many intermediate agents, such as wholesalers, lease companies, and so on They play differentroles and carry out relevant activities Without considering the details about each activity, theproviding-receiving service relationship can be represented by flow model which is realized by the toplevel net of HCPNs depicted as Figure 1 Where, a service provider is a place that has only outgoingarcs; a service receiver is a place that has only incoming arcs; an intermediate agent is a place that hasboth incoming arcs and outgoing arcs The places of the top level net are all typed as E By token e, wecan control the progress of the system Transitions tl~t8 of the top level net are all substitutiontransitions giving the scope models which determine the sub service activities
Trang 2Figure 1: Flow model of producing-consuming System Figure 2: Scope model of rental service
3 SCOPE MODEL OF THE CONSUMER ELECTRONICS RENTAL SERVICE
In this paper, because we are interested in the sub service bout "leasing", we will pay more attention to
the activity caused by Lease companyl to Consumer The sub page corresponding to substitutiontransition t3 gives the scope model about it, just depicted as Figure 2 In this activity, Lease companylwill provide the consumers with electronics rental service The consumers will evaluate the servicewith 4 RSPs: Rental Expenses, Installation Trouble, Maintenance and Repair Trouble, and DisposalTrouble So we define 4 places to represent these 4 RSPs respectively They all are typed as INT,indicating that the color value is integer representing the satisfaction degree corresponding to eachRSP Transition t35 represents the event that the rental service is provided We give an evaluatingcriterion on which the consumer judges this service by a transition guard By using RSPs, the scopemodel can describe not only whether the consumer can receive the material contents but also whetherthe consumer is satisfied with the service contents
4 VIEW MODELS OF THE CONSUMER ELECTRONICS RENTAL SERVICE
In the scope model, we don't consider how lease companyl will manage the rental service, neither
how the service management will influence these 4 RSPs We will describe the details by the viewmodels realized by the relevant sub pages corresponding to the substitution transitions t31, t32, t33, t34
of the scope model respectively These 4 RSPs are influenced by many aspects respectively In theview models we will represent these aspects using places which all are typed as INT
The evaluation about Rental Expenses is described by the view model corresponding to the sub page ofthe substitution transitions t31 of the scope model, just depicted as Figure 3 The evaluation aboutInstallation Trouble is described by the view model corresponding to the sub page of the substitutiontransitions t32 of the scope model, just depicted as Figure 4 The evaluation about Maintenance andRepair Trouble is more complicated, and is described by the view model corresponding to the sub page
of the substitution transitions t33 of the scope model, just depicted as Figure 5 The evaluation aboutDisposal Trouble is described by the view model corresponding to the sub page of the substitutiontransitions t34 of the scope model, just depicted as Figure 6
Trang 3Ch51-I044963.fm Page 256 Thursday, July 27, 2006 8:10 AM Ch51-I044963.fm Page 256 Thursday, July 27, 2006 8:10AM
256
Figure 3: View model about Rental Expenses Figure 4: View model about Installation Trouble
Figure 5: View model for maintenance and repair trouble Figure 6: View model for disposal trouble
REFERENCES
Jensen Kurt (2004) CPN Tools Online: http://wiki.daimi.au.dk/cpntools/cpntools.wiki
Tomiyama T Service Engineering to Intensify Service Contents in Product Life Cycles Proceedings
of the 2nd International Symposium on Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing,
IEEE Computer Society, 613-618
Shimomura Y., et al (2003) A Proposal for Service Modeling Proceeding of 3rd Int Symposium on
Environmentally Conscious Design and Inverse Manufacturing, IEEE Computer Society, 75-80.
Trang 4Institute of Technology, Shimizu Corporation, Tokyo 135-8530, Japan
1 Osaka University, Graduate School of Engineering, Suita, Osaka 565, Japan
3 CSP Japan, Tokyo 100-0011, Japan
He confronts with burning potential of opposites at every decision point- to the left or to the right, up
or down, metaphorically, A or ~A, speaking most generically, where both opposites coexist in acting
potential, and both are capable of being, but not yet in existence as event This mode of existence iscalled acting potential, whose opposite elements are both rushing toward realization, and only one ofwhich will be realized In design process, it is the opposite alternatives for almost every parameter thatare concerned and stand together under severe contention This manuscript investigates the peculiarcharacteristics of acting potential, the logical relation between potentials and events, and theconsequent dynamic interaction (Prigogine 1980, Kauffman 1993) among them, which may provide uswith better understanding of the underlying mechanism how the opposites influence a decision-making
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MODEL OF ACTING POTENTIALS
The collection of the common attributes which all the elements in a set equally share beyond their ownpeculiarities is called intensity of the set, while the collection of the members is the extension of theset The intensity is reciprocal to the extension (Russell and Whitehead 1910) There are two ends inthe universe of the set theory, the empty set and the universe Taking limits towards both ends, theintensity of the empty set is °° and that of the universe is 0 The universe has no intensity, i.e nocommon ascribable attribute as long as we stay inside the universe (unless from outside, i.e from a
view of a larger whole, it cannot obtain any attribute A, for the attribute requires the existence of its opposite ~A for A to be defined).
On the other, the empty set could be deemed to contain all the possible pairs of opposite attributes,
since <f> = A D ~A for any attribute A relevant in the universe currently dealt with Any attribute A that predicates the empty set is necessarily cancelled out by its opposite attribute ~A in the view of
extension, whose cancellation does not however evade that the empty set contains both oppositeattributes in the view of intensity The empty set therefore transcends all and contains all - in short, 'it
is empty, but plenum'
The two extremes in the set theory, the empty set and the universe therefore may be deemed as the twoopposite wholes, the intensional whole and the extensional whole respectively The extensional andintensional wholes were shown as two reciprocal modes of the Whole They are two modes ofexistence, to which the domains of events and of potentials correspond respectively
The Whole must thus satisfy the double-fold requirements in its unity; (1) the requirement that theWhole is one, and (2) that there are two distinct reciprocal modes of the Whole A Mobius strip asshown at Figure 1 can give a plausible model for the Whole so defined to satisfy the double-fold
requirements above The universe £1 yields its copies with different dimidiated partition according to
every possible pair of opposite attributes A series of (infinitely many) copies with different
partitioning, Q A , Q, B , Q c , ••• is thus obtained Let these copies raise perpendicular to the Mobius
surface and align along the surface, whose intersections equally represent the empty set, e.g <f> = AP\
~Afor any attribute A on the surface.
In this regards, the Mobius model constitutes the null </) along its surface as just one single surface globally, and rends all the possible opposite attributes across its two local faces everywhere It unifies
the reciprocal modes of the Whole, the intensional whole along the null surface and extensionalwholes across the surface; (1) The Mobius null surface models the Potential as the intensional whole,pure being of potentials as plenum of attributes It renders existence to the extensional universe ofevents and its constituents, (2) an event occurs, when a choice is made out of every attributableopposite It is because collapsing over the null direction determines the unique accumulation ofattributes relevant to a particular event, (3) whenever and wherever an event occurs, holding itselfexistent extensionally, the Potential acts on the event intensionally to render existence to the eventfrom behind
DYNAMIC INTERACTION OF OPPOSITES
The innate dynamic interaction of opposites for decision making is thus found well represented by theMobius model Given that both wholes, intensional and extensional, are reciprocal opposites, when theone covers the whole surface as it should, there remains no room for the other whole Immediatelyafter the one whole covers the whole surface, it cannot hold itself, for the one requires its opposite to
Trang 6Figure 1: Model for Dynamic Unification of the Acting Potential and Event
The dynamic interaction goes way beyond dynamics of events, physical or otherwise It is the morefundamental movement between the two wholes that molds both events and potentials with itsdynamic framework It is not just logically anticipated, but governing principle of reality, more akin to
Heraclites' proposition in antiquity "all is in a state of flux" (Russell 1945) Tt also gives the substantial ground why the opposite things interact at first place, A and ~A, opposing alternatives
which press on decision makers under impending pressure both in the domains of potentials and ofevents The potential mode of existence is particularly relevant to decision making, where the oppositepotencies are both rushing toward realization as event, but only one of which will be realizedexclusively
One of the simplest equations among possible others which entertains the Mobius model is the
Verhulst equation, x,,+i = b x n • ~x n (Verhulst 1845, Feigenbaum 1978) It is not only relevant to theoriginal application for the growth of populations, but for the rather far-reaching extension ofapplication, that is describing the deterministic interaction of opposites in the process of decisionmaking The Verhulst equation expresses iterative interplay of reciprocalities of two kinds, additive
and multiplicative (x,, + ~x n = 1 and x,, ' ~x n = ^ n +\ (= x n+i Ib ), respectively) at the right hand side of
the equation Both of them equally satisfy the defining relation of reciprocality among the quantities oftwo or more variables in a way that when one quantity increases, the other decreases or the other wayaround, though their quite distinct ways of increasing or decreasing
The Verhulst equation embodies a representation of the iterative fundamental movement between twodistinctive wholes, the domains of events and of potentials by capturing the interplay of both types of
reciprocals, x • ~x =1 and x + ~x = 1 Such iterative interplay between both types normally leads to a
complex behavior as depicted at Figure2 The equation consists of a series of steps of transformations,where the fundamental movement between two wholes governs along the Mobius surface (Eqn.l); An
event x,, at n"' generation occurs in the domain of events, and determines it's unrealized opposite \-x n (= ~x n ) The opposite then moves to the domain of intension or potential, where both x n and ~x n reside
as opposite potentials in the form of x n '~x n The potential then produces an event of n+\ th generation
by the dynamic law of Verhulst, x n+ i=bx,,'~x n (Note: The additive reciprocality, x n + ~x n = 1 expresses the
sum of opposites is the whole or "the whole is the sum of parts" It is the distinctive characteristic of extension It does not hold for the intensional whole which completely lacks extension The multiplicative reciprocality, x r • ~x rl
— 1 is rather "the intensional whole is the product of parts", for the intensional parts of attributes are all enfolded in
one entangled state of the intensional whole This entanglement establishes a product as the natural operator for thedomain of the intensional whole, where an essential non-linearity reigns.)
Trang 7A decision maker who manages production process confronts with pouncing disturbance He must
achieve a dynamic equilibrium upon the sweeping waves of both internally and externally oriented
disturbance to hold the goal of the whole inviolable at every phase of production, which requires a
series of decision making to amend his course of action upon disturbance However, a decision making
itself can be a source of considerable disturbance or, even more than often, it is the primary source,
where the opposite alternatives are acting potential for most of decision making This characteristic
state of potential, that is "though neither yet in existence, both opposites are equally capable of being,
and contending toward existence" must be properly modeled to understand the mechanism how the
real acting potential of opposites undeniably observable in day-to-day human activities, acts on the
outcome of choice, and its consequence The dynamic togetherness of two reciprocal wholes is the
primary cause of interference among opposites which produce a complex behavior The Verhulst
equation exemplifies one of the simplest kinds which possibly describe complexity due to interaction
between the domains of potentials and of events
REFERENCES
Feigenbaum M (1978) Quantitative Universality for a Class of Nonlinear Transformations, J Statistical Phys.
19:25
Kauffman S (1993) The Origins of Order- Self organization and Selection in Evolution, Oxford University
Press, Oxford, ISBN: 0-19-505811-9
Prigogine I (1980) From Being to Becoming- Time and Complexity in the Physical Sciences, W.H Freeman
and Company, New York, ISBN: 0-7167-1108-7
Russell B and Whitehead A, N (1910) Principia Mathematica, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK
Russell B (1945) History of Western Philosophy, Routledge, Oxford, ISBN: 0415325056
Verhulst P, F (1845) Recherches mathematiques sur la loi d'accroissement de la population, Nouv mem De
VAcademie Royale des Sci et Belles-Lettres de Bruxelles 18, 1-41
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ENHANCED DISTRIBUTED-SIMULATION USING ORiN AND HLA
Toshihiro INUKAI1, Hironori HIBINO2, Yoshihiro FUKUDA3
'FA Engineering Department, DENSO WAVE Inc.,1-1 Showa-cho, Kariya-shi, Aichi 448-8661, Japan
2Technical Research Institute of JSPMI,1-1-12 Hachiman-cho, Higashikurume-shi, Tokyo 203-0042, Japan
Faculty of Engineering, Hosei University,3-7-2 Kajino-cho, Koganei-shi, Tokyo 184-8584, Japan
To solve this problem, current simulators are trying to integrate many functions into themselves Forinstance, some robot simulators have the function to convert the simulation language to the
Trang 9BASIC CONCEPT
The procedure for developing a manufacturing system is commonly based on the waterfall model toreduce a waste of loop-back and re-doing But still there are many loop-backs on each process It isdifficult to shorten the manufacturing system development time without reducing the loop-backs.Therefore, it is necessary for development time reduction to reduce the "loop frequency" and/or toshorten the "loop time"
To reduce the loop frequency, the upper-layer design process should be highly accurate To achievethis goal, the FA programming task in the simulation environment is indispensable However, thiscauses increase in modelling cost and deterioration of cost-effectiveness The simulation is not usuallyused at the implementation stage for these reasons
As a solution of this problem, we propose an architecture that enables diverting the simulationprogram to the real device in the implementation stage The point is to use the same model throughoutthe manufacturing system life cycle This means that an implementation task is to embody the exactlysame model as the real devices And this leads to the wide-use of the simulator at the implementationstage As a result, this also leads to shorter average loop time because of the easier loop back in thesimulation
However, it is easy to imagine the difficulty of creating the simulation environment which is usable inall stages of the manufacturing system construction The difficulty originates from the fact that theproduction system is composed of quite a lot of FA devices Moreover the user programs of thosedevices are described not in a simulation language but in a ladder language or a robot language, etc.Therefore, we propose architecture of using a real FA device in one simulation environment By usingactual ladder programs or robot programs in the simulation, the simulation accuracy can be improved,and those programs can be reused at the implementation stage
To achieve this simulation environment, it is necessary to realize the following four functions.1) Function to abstract a wide variety of FA devices
2) Function to absorb the differences between the abstracted devices and the real devices
3) Function to connect the abstracted devices logically
4) Function to simulate the mechanical motion by the signal from the abstracted device
In addition, to execute a manufacturing cell simulation in the real production environment such as theproduction order patterns, it is necessary to make an interaction with the upper-layer simulators such
as a production line simulator Therefore the following two functions are also required
5) Function to exchange data between the cell simulator and the upper-layer production simulators.6) Function to manage the logical time and the synchronization between simulators
Trang 10Ch53-I044963.fm Page 263 Tuesday, August 1, 2006 4:09 PM Ch53-I044963.fm Page 263 Tuesday, August 1, 2006 4:09 PM
263
SYSTEM OVERVIEW
In the above-mentioned six functions, the function 1) and 2) are very important functions To realize
them, we developed "Open Resource interface for the Network, ORiN" [Inukai T and Sakakibara S.(2004)] ORiN is the base system of the following two sub-systems, "Soft-wiring system" and "CellSimulator" These systems are providing function 3) and 4) respectively
To accomplish the distributed simulation environment such as 5) and 6), we use "High LevelArchitecture, HLA [Hibino H & Fukuda Y (2002)] By using HLA, the synchronization and thelogical time management between simulators can be achieved Figure 1 shows our system overview of
a distributed real simulation environment [Inukai T., Hibino H and Fukuda Y (2004)]
Distributed Real Simulation
Distributed Simulation Environment
Figure 1: Distributed real simulation environmentORiN is a software interface for FA devices and the applications A real FA device is abstracted and isindirectly accessed through the ORiN platform Therefore the FA applications on ORiN access not areal device but an abstracted device In short, ORiN can absorb the differences of FA devices.Therefore ORiN applications are executable both in a real factory and a virtual factory
[1] "Soft-wiring system" provides the function to connect abstracted device logically By using thissystem, the information stored in I/O and variable of FA devices can be easily and intelligentlytransferred to the other FA devices Moreover different from conventional simulation system, thissystem can connect not only emulators, but also emulator and real device In other words, the clientprogram need not distinguish whether the supplied data is from a real device or from its emulator Thedifference is completely encapsulated
[2] "Cell simulator" can provide the function to imitate mechanical motion in accordance with thesignals from the soft-wiring system The mechanical behaviours are represented by two-dimensionaltree structure, and its node represents a simple motion Complex motions are defined as a combination
of simple node By using this simulator, end-user can easily define the motion of production cell.[3] Synchronization mechanism and logical time management mechanism are very important toachieve the seamless communication between simulators The functions are provided by HLA andORiN-HLA gateway The upper-layer simulators connected to HLA can retrieve the information of areal device through the gateway, and vice versa
Trang 11End-users can not only make a program in ladder and/or robot language, but also check a mechanicalmotion and a cycle time, etc in a distributed real simulation environment Therefore, compared withthe stressful confirmation task in the real world, the user's load was much reduced.
• » - - * • - - - • ^ • • • ^ Cell Simulator [i ,
Real <r-» Virtual
Figure 2: A case study of cell simulation
CONCLUSION
In this paper, we proposed a distributed real simulation environment which composed of ORiN system,
soft-wiring system, cell simulation system and ORiN-HLA gateway By using this simulationenvironment, manufacturing system developers are able to use the same simulation model consistentlyfrom a design stage to an implementation stage A large-scale simulation and a highly accuratesimulation are also achieved Consequently end-users can perform a lot of tasks in the simulation
Trang 12Traditionally, embedded system design requires a considerable amount of expertise, time and money.This complicates the testing of new research results in robotics with real embedded systems, whichwould be necessary to bring the results into real use We are studying an easy and fast embeddedsystem development method that enables people without special skills in electronics or embeddedsystems to create such systems We hope that this method will ultimately enable utilization ofelectronics also in research domains where electronics skills are usually not available In this paper, wepresent an embedded object based architecture, and the ideology of fitting this architecture into thecommon object-oriented methods used in software development We also describe its application tocombined software and hardware entities This paper concentrates on explaining the ideology andarchitecture of this approach
Trang 13of science, thus giving totally new possibilities for non-technical research.
We have studied how the high-level software language techniques could be applied to the process ofdeveloping an embedded system We propose an architecture and a development method for embeddedsystems that is something between LEGO robotics and extended MOOSE, enabling easy building ofobject oriented embedded systems with minimal limitations
HARDWARE MODEL FOR AN OBJECT-ORIENTED EMBEDDED SYSTEM
DEVELOPMENT METHOD
Introduction
Our method is based on small embedded objects called Atomi-objects Embedded object means thatthe Atomi is an object in both software and hardware (embedded system) aspect Atomis are smallelectronic boards that contain some sensor circuits, actuator drivers, or other functionality Thesoftware of an Atomi resembles an Automation object (ActiveX Control) by Microsoft It hasproperties, methods, and events that correspond to the physical functionality of the Atomi In otherwords, one can set different properties of an Atomi (such as intensity of a light), run methods (such as
a sequence of positions for a servo), and set an Atomi to respond to events (for example, when heat isbelow the threshold in a temperature sensor Atomi, the switch property of a heater Atomi is turned on).Atomi boards can be stacked together, and they interconnect through a simple field bus that isextended with a common voltage supply line (see Figure 1) Each board contains a microcontroller unit
Trang 14Servo control object AD-conversions object Device main control object Field bus
Servo connectors Sensor connectors
Field bus Simple device
7V— Device main control objectA-Servo control object
Servo •'
connectors I- AD-conversions object
Figure 1 Device built with embedded objects i.e Atomis
Object-oriented thinking
The advantages of object-oriented techniques (OOT) for software are well known (Booch, 1991,Yourdon, 1994, Martin and Odell, 1992) Many of them apply directly to hardware or an embeddedsystem, such as maintainability, reusability, stability, reliability, faster designing, and extensibility Inour case, one of the main reasons for using object-oriented technology is the goal of making an easy,high-level method to create embedded systems We consider Atomi as combined software andhardware object: each Atomi contains its own properties, events, and methods, which are related toeach Atomi's hardware functionalities As the benefits of the OOT are achieved via some fundamentalelements, such as modularity, encapsulation, abstraction, hierarchy, inheritance, and concurrency, it isrelevant to study how they can be realized in Atomis
Atomis realize modularity, encapsulation and concurrency naturally via their modular architecture.Modularity is important element for the high-level development goal, since it enables the use of libraryobjects i.e Atomis with ready-made low-level code and hardware The idea of encapsulation is that theinternal data is hidden from the other objects, and only accessible via specific methods Since thesoftware of an Atomi corresponds directly to the hardware, and Atomis are accessible only through thefield bus interface, this realizes naturally Concurrency means the handling of different eventssimultaneously In the Atomi context it is realized through the multiprocessor architecture
Abstraction and hierarchy are combined through inheritance Abstraction means presenting theessential characteristics of an object that distinguishes it from other types of objects, and hierarchymeans ranking or ordering these abstractions Inheritance represents a hierarchy of abstractions, inwhich a subclass (child) inherits from one or more superclasses (parents) (Booch, 1991) In the Atomiarchitecture, inheritance is realized at two levels A new object inheriting another object or objects can
be realized by just stacking the objects, i.e Atomis, together and writing new software for the newchild object This we call high-level inheritance (see Figure 2) Here, the child object controls theparent objects, while the interfacing to others takes place via the interface of the new child object Thisprocedure implements the inheritance of the parents as public class members, since others can accessthem directly because they are all on the same bus However, the new child object can also have twointerfaces (field bus interfaces and software protocol stacks) and thus implement the inheritance asprivate class members by attaching objects into the second bus, which is separated from the commonbus
Trang 15Other Atomi 1
Parent Atomi 3 Parent Atomi 4
public bus private bus
• " • •
| Parent Atomi 4 11 Parent Atomi 2 |.
private class members public class members
Figure 2 High-level inheritanceLow level inheritance is in question when a completely new Atomi is to be created In this case,inheritance is realized as a template or base Atomi object A template Atomi object, which can also bethought of as a generalized abstraction of an Atomi, contains the schematic and layout drawings of anAtomi consisting of the common hardware for the basic Atomi interface Correspondingly, there is asoftware template for operating this basic hardware Thus, inheriting the base Atomi object to create anew object is realized as copying the templates and adding the new components into half-readyschematics and PCB layout and the corresponding control functions for the software In our testsystem, the common hardware means an MCU and connectors, and the software means a field buscode with some interface-related code The low-level inheritance is very important for the flexibility ofthis architecture, as it enables fully customized Atomis to be created It also presents a problem for theease of the Atomi system, as it requires hardware development and hence also some skills andresources in electronics However, there is still a significant advantage over designing a whole newsystem, because large parts of the design process for the new Atomi are available as templates.The characteristics of OOT include the idea of increasing complexity by creating new objects out of aset of other objects This realizes in the high level inheritance, and it can be realized also by normalaggregation, i.e by creating a new object that includes other objects In the physical Atomiarchitecture however, both inheritance and aggregation realizes similarly, and there is thus not muchdifference Since new objects can be created by inheriting/aggregating objects that already haveinherited/aggregated objects, the complexity of objects and hence the device can be increased asneeded However, physical restrictions may become a problem at some point The major restrictingfactor for object-oriented architecture is the field bus The field bus capacity defines the real-timecapabilities of the system and the maximum number of objects in one bus However, the architecturecan be realized using almost any field bus Thus, larger systems may use faster buses Anotherrestricting factor could be the processing power of the MCU, but as the encapsulation suggests, eachobject can implement its functions hidden from others Thus, the objects can use any MCU that meetsthe processing requirements of its functions, as long as it just implements its interface
DISCUSSION
Towards high-level development
The object-oriented embedded system method has been tested in some devices (Vallius & Roning,2005a, Vallius & Roning, 2005b, Tikanmaki, Vallius & Roning, 2004) and it is found to be functional.The object-oriented embedded system method brings the development process one step closer to ahigh-level software programming language: an embedded system can be built by stacking up suitableembedded objects and then just adding a control code to a specific control object In other words, the