H.1 Overview

AutomationML (AML) is an international standard governed by the AutomationML association (legally AutomationML e.V., see AutomationML.org). AutomationML is a data exchange solution focusing on automation engineering. The data exchange format is defined in the IEC 62714-1series, “Engineering data exchange format for use in industrial automation systems engineering”.

The goal of AutomationML is to interconnect the engineering software tools from the different phases of the lifecycle and overall industrial automation disciplines (mechanical, electrical, process engineering, process control, HMI development, controller programming, etc.). It thereby forms an interoperable data space from a heterogeneous landscape. Using an object-oriented paradigm, AutomationML stores engineering information from the different disciplines to allow the modelling of physical and logical AutomationComponents.

An object in AutomationML is the data representation of an automation object or a group of automation objects. An object can consist of other sub-objects and may even be a part of a larger object. AutomationML supports many different hierarchies of objects. These objects can be representations of plant automation supporting information topology, geometry, kinematics, etc. Logical objects generally represent sequencing, behaviour, control, etc.

At the top level, AutomationML uses the CAEX data format, which provides the mechanisms for modelling user-defined data. Overall, AutomationML uses many industry data formats designed for the storage and exchange of different aspects of engineering information. These data formats are not changed for use in AutomationML but rather are used “as-is” from their respective specifications. CAEX is used to interconnect the different data formats.

An AutomationML Container is used to transport an AutomationML project consisting of multiple AutomationML documents and other non_AutomationML documents (supplemental information). Open Packaging Conventions specification is used as the container format. The file extension for an AutomationML Container is “.amlx”.

For the reader’s convenience, this informative appendix introduces a few basic concepts of AutomationML in a very concise manner. Further and more detailed information for AutomationML can be found at AutomationML.org. The reference white paper “AutomationML in a Nutshell” provides a primer for AutomationML. Note that all AutomationML whitepapers and recommendations are available to the general public free of charge at AutomationML.org.