An ontology for integrated machining and inspection process planning focusing on resource capabilities

The search for and assignment of resources is extremely important for the efficient planning of any process in a distributed environment, such as the collaborative product integrated development process. These environments require a degree of semantic interoperability, which currently can only be provided by ontological models. However, the ontological proposals centred on Resources for Machining and Inspection Process Planning have a limited reach, do not adopt a unified view of machining and inspection, and fail to express knowledge in the manner required by some of the planning tasks, as is the case with those concerned with resource assignment and plan validation. With the aim of providing a solution to these shortcomings the manufacturing and inspection resource capability (MIRC) ontology has been developed, as a specialist offshoot of the product and processes development resources capability ontology. This ontology considers resource capabilities to be a characteristic of the resource executing any activity present in an integrated process plan. Special attention is given to resource preparation activities, due to their influence on the quality of the final product. After describing the MIRC ontology, a case study demonstrates how the ontology supports the process planning for any level, approach or plan strategy.