Implementation approaches for the execution model of IEC 61499 applications

The paper presents different approaches to implement the execution model of an IEC 61499 application. The IEC 61499 standard defines the application as a function block network whose nodes are function blocks and whose branches are data/event connections. The standard provides also the execution model for a basic FB and the behavior of an instance, but these specifications are not exhaustive. Consequently, there may be many different implementations of the execution model that are all compliant with the standard but produce different behaviors. In this work, the standard is carefully analyzed in order to point out the parts where it is non-exhaustive. Furthermore, a set of implementation approaches are investigated underlying advantages and disadvantages of each solution.