A framework for evaluating a generic virtual commissioning data model

Abstract

The interoperability of different virtual commissioning applications requires a lot of manual work, as they mainly use proprietary file formats. In this case, a generic virtual commissioning data model is highly demanded to realize interoperability among different virtual commissioning applications. Based on this model, the effort of exchanging data between different virtual commissioning applications is significantly reduced. A comprehensive generic virtual commissioning data model contains a variety of virtual commissioning-related information, such as geometry, physics, kinematics, sensors, actuators, and signal connections. For such an elaborate data model, no method is contemporarily indicated to evaluate its interoperability performance. Thus, in this paper, a case-based evaluation framework is introduced to fill in this gap. With this framework, the interoperability performance of a generic virtual commissioning data model can be evaluated by conducting data exchange of several emulation models developed in different virtual commissioning applications, and each of their specific virtual commissioning modeling functions is covered in at least one of these emulation models. As an example, a case study is presented by exchanging 10 carefully selected emulation models between Siemens NX and Visual Components software applications via AutomationML data format. Based on the case study, the applicability of this evaluation framework is analyzed and discussed. Finally, conclusion and outlook are illustrated in the end.