Control of discrete event systems: theory and application
Silvano Balemi · Repository for Publications and Research Data (ETH Zurich) · 1992
Control theory has been traditionally concerned with control of systems of continuous variables, modeled by difference or differential equations.Another important class of systems however is described by states which have logical or symbolic values instead of numerical ones.The changes of the system's states are events triggered by either an external action or a spontaneous change in the system.Such systems are called discrete event systems.The need to consider more closely this class of systems derives from the effort to extend systems theory to be able to control manufacturing systems, communication networks and other systems whose behavior can be described by a set of sequences of discrete events.A pioneering work in the field of discrete event systems has been performed by Ra- madge and Wonham.They proposed a model in which the events, all generated by a plant, are divided into two classes: controllable and uncontrollable events.Through the disablement of controllable events the behavior of the plant can be influenced to meet given specifications.