ASP‐driven e‐service platform for Web‐based online manufacturing

Abstract

Extends the concept of e‐service to the whole phase of manufacturing. Develops an e‐service platform prototype based on this concept with Java Web solution including the mobile agent broking technologies and application service provider (ASP) principle. The key point to implement the platform is to enable an open Web information service infrastructure for the whole product manufacturing chain. Inside this infrastructure, product‐specific online manufacturing system can be created by means of using a kind of bidding model. All users participating in the manufacturing process are able to cooperatively finish manufacturing tasks in real time through sharing the same platform. With the help of BOM flow, the global information service flow can be controlled easily. In addition, the legacy hardware/software can also be encapsulated with aglets that are Java mobile agents. As to new ASP software packages, they can be configured simply via the plug and play mode to the e‐service platform. In this way, the on‐line networked manufacturing can be tested.