Establishing logical connections may involve creating several Objects within the AutomationComponents.

Persistence refers to the ability of AutomationComponents to store configuration, which allows these Objects to be restored after a power cycle or other restart. Individual logical connections may be marked for persistence (see IsPersistent in 6.6.2).

An AutomationComponent may provide preconfigured Objects (e.g., PublishedDataSet or ConnectionEndpoint). An example might be a FunctionalEntity that includes a preconfigured PublishedDataSet that is used as part of a logical connection. The other parts of the logical connection (e.g., ConnectionEndpoint, WriterGroup, DataSetWriter) are all created during connection establishment. If the Connection is not marked for persistence, the other parts are deleted on clean-up or on a power cycle, and the preconfigured Objects will remain.