Virtual tool box for use with industrial control system

An industrial control system for controlling the operation of a process executed on a plurality of spatially separate machines, the control system comprising:

• a data network;
• a plurality of interface circuits connected to the data network and proximate to ones of the machines, the interface circuits providing output signals to the machines and receiving input signals from the machines;
• a plurality of operator terminals connected to the data network and proximate to ones of the machines, the interface circuits providing operator outputs to a human operator and receiving operator inputs from a human operator, the operator terminals further having operator identification means for producing an operator identification signal identifying a proximate human operator;
• an electronic computer communicating with the interface circuits and the operator terminals via the data network and
• (i) executing a control program to read the input signals from the interface circuits and to generate the output signals to the interface circuits based on the input signals and associated portions of the control program;
• (ii) executing an operator program to generate data for the operator outputs;
• (iii) execute a routing program to direct the data for the operator outputs to particular operator terminals based on the operator identification signals without interruption of the execution of the operator program;
• whereby an operator program may seamlessly follow a human operator about the factory.