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From Requirements to Executable Rules: An Ensemble of Domain-Specific Languages for Programming Cyber-Physical Systems in Warehouse Logistics

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Leveraging Applications of Formal Methods, Verification and Validation (ISoLA 2021)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 13036))

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Abstract

The fourth industrial revolution is driven by Software-enabled automation. To fully realize the potential of this digital transformation in a way that is beneficial to society, automation needs to become programmable by domain experts—the vision being a Software-assisted increase in productivity instead of replacing workers with Software. While domain experts, e.g., workers in production, typically have extensive experience with processes and workflows involving cyber-physical systems, e.g., production machines, they have little to no knowledge of programming and formal logic. In this paper, we present a framework for expressing executable rules in the context of a cyber-physical system at the conceptual level, akin to human reasoning, in almost natural sentences (e.g., if a person is within 1 m of the machine then the light will turn red). These requirements are automatically transformed by our framework into formal logic and can be executed and evaluated by a rule engine without additional input by domain experts. The framework is designed in a modular way that enables domain engineering, i.e., the development of new languages for individual application domains, with minimal effort. Only domain-specific entities and predicates (e.g., is within) need to be defined and implemented for a new domain. We demonstrate our framework in a logistics scenario on a shop floor that requires human-machine collaboration.

The Research has been executed within the centre of excellence Logistics and IT which is funded by the Ministry of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia and the Fraunhofer Society for the Advancement of Applied Research.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://www.mendix.com/.

  2. 2.

    https://www.creatio.com.

  3. 3.

    https://www.pega.com/.

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Correspondence to Malte Mauritz .

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Mauritz, M., Roidl, M. (2021). From Requirements to Executable Rules: An Ensemble of Domain-Specific Languages for Programming Cyber-Physical Systems in Warehouse Logistics. In: Margaria, T., Steffen, B. (eds) Leveraging Applications of Formal Methods, Verification and Validation. ISoLA 2021. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 13036. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-89159-6_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-89159-6_11

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