Resilient failover of industrial programmable logic controllers

A system for performing failover for programmable logic controllers in an automation environment and controlling a physical system, the system comprising:

• a first input/output module;
• and
• a second input/output module,
• wherein the first input/output module comprises:
• a sensor input port configured to receive sensor inputs from one or more field devices;
• a duplicate inputs programming component configured to:
• create a copy of the sensor inputs for a first group of programmable logic controllers (PLCs) in a first PLC bank and
• transfer the copy the sensor inputs to each PLC in the first group of PLCs;
• and
• a PLC input port configured to receive processing results from each PLC in the first group of PLCs in response to transferring the copy of the sensor inputs;
• a compare and drop programming component configured to:
• determine whether there are any inconsistencies between the processing results received from each PLC in the first group of PLCs;
• and
• if there are any inconsistencies between the processing results received from each PLC in the first group of PLCs, initiate a failover control process by sending a failover control message to the second input/output module.

A programmable logic controller comprising:

• a non-volatile memory storing a group of application binary files, wherein each application binary file in the group of application binary files is distinct and functionally equivalent to other application binary files in the group;
• and
• a regeneration programming component configured to:
• in response to receiving a regeneration command from an input/output module, selecting a new control application binary file from the group of application binary files;
• compile the new control application binary file into an executable file;
• transmit a regeneration complete message to the input/output module;
• and
• execute the executable file.