Extension of reconfigurability provisions in IEC 61499

This paper presents an investigation into the implementation of reconfigurable industrial applications using the IEC 61499 standard. An architecture and design methodology is proposed to allow for the addition of reconfigurable elements to existing IEC 61499 applications. The commercially available NxtForte IEC 61499 platform was chosen for experiments. The notion of state resumption is discussed along with a corresponding application level implementation. Deficiencies of the standard for promoting reconfiguration are outlined and some extensions are then proposed to streamline the development of reconfigurable applications.