Methods and apparatus for process, factory-floor, environmental, computer aided manufacturing-based or other control system with unified messaging interface

A system for process control, factory-floor control, environmental control, and/or computer aided manufacturing control collectively, “process control,” comprising:

• A. a plurality of control applications that interface with an operator and/or control equipment for said process,
• B. a workflow processing engine in communications coupling with the plurality of control applications, the workflow processing engine processing one or more workflows, each defining one or more actions to be taken in response to events occurring with respect to the process and/or control applications,
• C. the workflow processing engine executing a user interface action included in one of the workflows by formatting in XML a message for presentation to the operator and/or control equipment and transmitting said message to a queue,
• D. a said control application retrieving said message from the queue and presenting to said operator and/or control equipment a corresponding prompt,
• E. the control application that retrieved the message
• i. responding to action by said operator and/or control equipment with respect to said prompt by presenting content of the corresponding message to said operator and/or control equipment, the presenting step including applying the message along with a style sheet to an interface,
• ii. responding to action by said operator and/or control equipment with respect to the presented message by transmitting a response thereto,
• iii. responding to successful transmittal of said response by dequeuing the message to which the response corresponded,
• iv. responding to any of cancellation or absence of susseful transmittal of said response by any of maintaining or requeuing the message to which to response corresponded.

In a method of process control, factory-floor control, environmental control, and/or computer aided manufacturing control collectively, “process control,” the improvement comprising:

• A. executing one or more workflows, each defining one or more actions to be taken in response to events occurring with respect to the process and/or one or more control applications, the one or more control applications interfacing with an operator and/or control equipment for the process,
• B. monitoring the process and/or control applications and responding to detected events by selectively executing a messaging action associated with one or more of the workflows, the execution of the messaging action including transmitting to a queue, a message for presentation to the operator and/or control equipment, the message being formatted in a markup language;
• C. with said control application retrieving one or more of said messages form the queue and presenting to said operator and/or control equipment one or more corresponding prompts,
• D. responding to action by said operator and/or control equipment with respect to a said prompt by presenting content of the corresponding message to said operator and/or control equipment, the presenting step including applying the message along with a style sheet to an interface,
• E. responding to action by said operator and/or control equipment with respect to the presented message by transmitting a response thereto,
• F. responding to successful transmittal of said response by dequeuing said message,
• G. responding to any of cancellation or absence of successful transmittal of said response by any of maintaining or requeuing said message.