8. Coordination Control of Complex Machines

Control and coordination are important aspects of the development of complex machines due to an ever-increasing demand for better functionality, quality, and performance. In WP6 of the C4C project, we developed a synthesis-centric systems engineering framework suitable for supervisory coordination of complex systems. The framework was employed to synthesize and validate a supervisory coordinator for maintenance procedures for a prototype of a high-tech Océ printer, showing proof of concept and viability of the proposed framework. The supervisor eliminates undesired behavior that could occur as a result of undesired interaction of the distributed printer components. In this chapter, we discuss the model-based systems engineering framework that was employed for synthesis of the supervisor, and we illustrate the modeling process.