Application of a capability-based adaptation methodology to a small-size production system

Today's production systems need to adapt rapidly to changing product requirements. Adaptation can be eased by formal models, representing product requirements and system capabilities, which convey the necessary information for adaptation planning activities. This paper presents an adaptation approach based on matching product requirements with resource capabilities, and applies it to a practical case study in TUT-microfactory environment. The main emphasis is placed firstly on introducing the ontological resource description, which facilitates the representation of resource capabilities. Secondly, the rules, according to which information about product requirements and resource capabilities is compared to find the match, are highlighted. The proposed approach facilitates automatic filtering, reasoning, and generation of alternative adaptation scenarios from a vast amount of resource information. As a result, less manual information handling and reasoning are required during adaptation planning.