Large-scale comprehensive real-time monitoring framework for industrial facilities

A non-transitory computer readable medium encoded with a computer program, the computer program comprising:

• computer readable program code for causing at least one processing device to use one or more graphical function blocks in a graphical application to identify relationships between input variables and output variables of multiple real-time applications associated with a framework, generate a variable dependency matrix for each application, and combine the variable dependency matrices for the applications to generate a final variable dependency matrix defining a hierarchy of variables, the variable dependency matrices used to identify data dependencies, the applications comprising applications for monitoring or controlling equipment in at least one industrial facility, each application having at least one input variable and at least one output variable that are stored in at least one memory, the framework comprising an execution environment, an input/output (IO) environment, and a data cache;
• computer readable program code for storing, in the data cache, data being transported between the execution environment and the IO environment in real-time, wherein the data is stored in an address format defined by a data model configured by a user for the framework;
• and
• computer readable program code for causing the at least one processing device, after the data cache has received a change to at least one of the input or output variables, to identify at least one of the applications associated with the at least one changed variable based on the data dependencies and publish the at least one changed variable to the at least one identified application to support data driven operation of the framework;
• wherein the data-driven operation of the framework is configured to provide data to the applications to support at least one of:
• performance monitoring of the equipment, analysis of the equipment's operation, and identification of abnormal equipment conditions,
• wherein the framework further comprises multiple layers, the layers comprising:
• a data collector layer configured to receive the at least one changed variable from data sources;
• a data validation layer configured to validate the received at least one changed variable;
• an extraction layer configured to identify key process indicators associated with the equipment using the at least one changed variable;
• a fault diagnosis layer configured to identify faults associated with sub-components of the equipment;
• and
• a health index integration layer configured to identify health index values for the equipment using the identified faults.

A system comprising:

• at least one interface configured to receive data associated with equipment in at least one industrial facility;
• and
• at least one processing device configured to:
• use one or more graphical function blocks in a graphical application to identify relationships between input variables and output variables of multiple real-time applications associated with a framework, generate a variable dependency matrix for each application, and combine the variable dependency matrices for the applications to generate a final variable dependency matrix defining a hierarchy of variables, the variable dependency matrices used to identify data dependencies, the real-time applications comprising applications for monitoring or controlling the equipment, each application having at least one input variable and at least one output variable that are stored in at least one memory, the framework comprising an execution environment, an input/output (IO) environment, and a data cache;
• store, in the data cache, data being transported between the execution environment and the IO environment in real-time, wherein the data is stored in an address format defined by a data model configured by a user for the framework;
• and
• after the data cache has received a change to at least one of the input or output variables, identify at least one of the applications associated with the at least one changed variable based on the data dependencies and publish the at least one changed variable to the at least one identified application to support data driven operation of the framework;
• wherein the data-driven operation of the framework is configured to provide the data to the applications to support at least one of:
• performance monitoring of the equipment, analysis of the equipment's operation, and identification of abnormal equipment conditions,
• wherein the framework further comprises multiple layers, the layers comprising:
• a data collector layer configured to receive the at least one changed variable from data sources;
• a data validation layer configured to validate the received at least one changed variable;
• an extraction layer configured to identify key process indicators associated with the equipment using the at least one changed variable;
• a fault diagnosis layer configured to identify faults associated with sub-components of the equipment;
• and
• a health index integration layer configured to identify health index values for the equipment using the identified faults.