Scenario 34 - Engineering Change Scenario

34.0 Overview

Scenario #34 describes the integration of stake holders, engineering - design (PDM), manufacturing (ERP) and manufacturing execution (MES) software.

The purpose of this scenario is to enable the visualization of the participants in the process and the dialogs between them for this specific integration. This scenario is not meant to be the only model for integrating general ledger applications to a budget applications. This is simply one model that may be used to guide one’s own integration efforts.

34.1 Scenario

The scenario below contains the participants involved in the interaction, the dialog flows or conversation between them, certain assumptions about the sequence of events, and assumptions about the technical approach, for example, publish and subscribe.

This is a model to be used as a design recommendation, not a required approach.

34.2 Assumptions

This scenario assumes a loosely coupled, asynchronous approach with transaction management required but not explicitly defined.

This scenario describes a model for one or more Design Engineering components integrating with other common Manufacturing and Distribution components.

The environment for this integration may be within a single enterprise, or across enterprises.

There may be instances where the information in an engineering change request can be at the level of requirements, and desired behavior.

As an engineering change moves through its lifecycle, the information must become more and more detailed.

As the change moves into the actual engineering change order phase, it must contain all the information needed to manufacture the item or items.

34.3 Component Definitions

This scenario contains four major participants; stakeholders and design engineering, manufacturing requirements planning (MRP) and manufacturing execution (MES) software.

The definitions and details of these applications are left to the designer but are assumed to contain the functionality as defined by what is commonly sold in the commercial market place today. This definition is broadly accepted by the scenario designers and is a direct result of the decision not to define how the processing takes place within any individual application.

Each application must be able perform the services defined by the message BOD (business object document), but the internals of the application are not required or desired to be exposed at this level of standardized abstraction.

The most important factors in defining these participants is to ensure that an integration designer can communicate the requirements precisely enough to detail the interfaces needed and their interrelationships.

34.4 Business Workflow (Sequence)

The business workflow is graphically represented by starting at the Scenario top and reading from top down and from left to right.

This scenario has two major events in the workflow sequence. The trigger event is the request for an engineering change that is made from any client department. It initiates a synchronization process to ensure that all of the components in the integration scenario will have the same data necessary to communicate. Next is the creation of the engineering change request in the engineering systems. The next event may be that the engineering change is communicated broadly to a set of contributors to a design. The fourth event may be that the engineering change is believed by the designers to meet the requirements stated in the specification. A notification is sent out to a list of approvers to sign off on the change before it can go to the next stage. The fifth event is that the approvers send in their approvals and the design change can be sent to manufacturing engineering to make any modifications to the assembly operations for any effected parts, or equipment. The sixth event is that manufacturing engineering are informed that the authorized method of manufacture has changed.

34.5 Exception Handling

Exception handling is highly localized as the result of an implementation’s infrastructure, management and business rules. As such, this section of the Scenario documentation is planned to be used as a guide to help understand the additional intent of these Scenarios. If no exceptions are noted here, then it can be assumed that the Scenario designers agreed that the Scenario is straight forward and has no additional needs:

  • Note that the Confirm BOD is not shown in the scenario and that it is the most obvious method for providing an application level exception and feedback mechanism between business software components. Full Confirm BOD use is described in other OAGIS documentation in detail, but it should be noted that the specific use of the Confirm BOD may vary significantly from scenario to scenario and from integration to integration.

  • The Confirm BOD is typically intended to be used by the original receiving application to communicate to the sending application that the information it sent in the message BOD (business object document) was received and understood and can be processed.

  • If the information was not received or nor understood, or contained errors of any type, it is accepted practice for the OAGIS users to presume that the data was not acted on and in the absence of a Confirm BOD within a partnership previously agreed to time limit to resend the original message again.

  • As errors and assumptions are the bane of any implementation, it is strongly recommended that the Confirm BOD be used to prevent any potential problem although it is not a requirement by OAGIS use.

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