US 6,414,594 B1 · Method and apparatus for user-initiated alarms in process control system

Abstract

A user interface provides the operator of an industrial process control system the ability to set user-initiated alarms on selected parameters representative of a process being controlled, independent of predetermined alarm limits. The interface allows the operator to identify parameters to monitor, when to monitor the parameters, when to trigger alarms, and allows the operator to determine how to be notified that a user-initiated alarm has been triggered. A template having blanks to fill in information related to the alarm limits is provided and has drop down menus providing alternatives. Selecting an icon on a schematic representative of a process causes the template to pop up in a window type of environment with relevant data already filled in. The completion of the template results in a message being sent to a process module which provides real time values of the parameters.

Claims23

Dependent claims

A distributed industrial process control system having alarm limits predetermined by a process engineer, the distributed process control system comprising:

a plurality of sensors coupled to a plurality of I/O buses, that sense physical conditions and provide values of parameters on the I/O buses representative of the physical conditions;
a plurality of devices coupled to the I/O buses that control process flow responsive to set point parameters and output value parameters;
a plurality of process modules, each coupled to an I/O bus that receives values of parameters from the sensors and provides set point parameters to the devices, the process modules having predetermined alarm limits set therein for monitoring the values of parameters with respect to the predetermined alarm limits and generating alarms when such limits have been met;
a plurality of network interface modules coupled to the process modules and to a local control network that transfers alarms and parameters from the process modules to the local control network;
a user station coupled to the local control network that enables a process control system operator to generate user-initiated alarm limits related to current diagnostic needs for one or more sensors and devices independent of the predetermined alarm limits, and that communicates information related to the user-initiated alarm limits to the process modules to direct the process modules to provide selected parameter values to the user station, and wherein the user station compares the parameter values to the user-initiated alarm limits and generates an alarm when the limits have been satisfied;
wherein the alarm generated by the user-initiated alarm limit indicates that an operator-selected parameter has reached an operator-defined limit.

3 more elements

A storage medium having a computer program stored thereon for causing a suitably programmed system to provide user-initiated alarms in a distributed process control system having a plurality of points with predetermined alarm limits set by a process engineer wherein predetermined alarms are provided when the predetermined alarm limits are exceeded, by performing the following steps when such program is executed on the system:

providing an operator of the distributed process control system the ability to identify a point and an associated parameter, to set a user-initiated alarm limit with respect to an operator-defined value of the parameter independent of the predetermined alarm limits;
monitoring the parameter;
providing an alarm when the parameter has reached the user-initiated alarm limit;
and
providing the user with the ability to specify the type of alarm to be provided.

2 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Method and apparatus for user-initiated alarms in process control system

Life of this patent

Method and apparatus for user-initiated alarms in process control system

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims23