Strategy editor for process control supporting drag and drop connections to declarations

Abstract

Enhancements to a strategy object editor for creating and modifying control strategies for process control systems (both distributed and discrete) is described. The improvements include: supporting a set of graphical depictions for individual control object (modified by an appearance object editor), drag and drop connections for declarations that connect control strategies to other control strategies, GUI-based designation of object execution order, automatically applied line styles based upon connection data type, and automatic modification of elements within an appearance object to accommodate a moved attribute.

1 . A method for creating, within a control program development editor facility including a graphical user interface, a connection between an I/O attribute of a control object graphically represented on a first control strategy canvas and a second control strategy located outside the first control strategy through a declaration, the method comprising the steps of: 
 specifying a name for the declaration within a declarations area of the editor facility's graphical user interface;    creating a graphical declaration representation of the declaration in response to a user action of selecting the name for the declaration in the declarations area and indicating a location for graphical declaration representation within the first control strategy canvas; and    creating a connection between the declaration and an I/O attribute of a control object graphically represented in the first control strategy canvas using graphical user interface pointer actions.    
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1  further comprising the step of completing the connection between the I/O attribute on the first control strategy and a complimentary declaration by specifying a connection reference for the declaration in the declarations area.