Help committee members increase dialog about, completion of, interest in, and use of Make2Pack ISA-88 Part 5. Join in with your comments or questions to help the standard along, on your way to gaining competitive advantage.
![]() |
David A. Chappell, Make2Pack chair, and other ISA88 Part 5 committee members provide intelligence and specific links for this effort, spanning OMAC, WBF, and ISA standards efforts. About Dave Chappell.
To comment on any blog posting, click on the post's highlighted text at top, then scroll down and use the "Post a Comment" box that appears at the bottom of the window for each posting.
Click here to receive an email when there's a new blog posting or comment to "Standard profits: Make2Pack and ISA88."
NOTE: ISA grants Reed Business Information the rights to post portions of the ISA88 (or other applicable standards) in this blog for comments and discussions. Reed Business Information clears use of postings (or comments) from this blog for ISA and related standards development.
Recent Posts
- Make2Pack ISA88 Part 5 Dayton meeting demo, scope, interoperability
- Refinement for the line in the sand between ISA88 Part 1 and Part 5
- Make2Pack definitions and descriptions for types of control
- A line in the sand: Equipment Phase
- Bigfoot, Lock Ness Monster sighted! Control types
- Upcoming Make2Pack meetings; get involved
- A Device is a Device is a Device; But what if it is not?
- Meeting: Replace babble of Control Components with understandable language, OPC help
- 1000s of solutions to any automation opportunity
- Machine modes, procedures, execute state
Recent Comments
- Jay Rouse on It’s elemental Mr. Watson: control system terms
- Another S88 Blogger on A Device is a Device is a Device; But what if it is not?
- Francis on 1000s of solutions to any automation opportunity
- Francis on Machine modes, procedures, execute state
- Francis on Mode is a many-splendored thing
Most Commented On
- Mode is a many-splendored thing (6)
- It’s elemental Mr. Watson: control system terms (2)
- 1000s of solutions to any automation opportunity (1)
- A Device is a Device is a Device; But what if it is not? (1)
- Machine modes, procedures, execute state (1)
Archives
Make2Pack ISA88 Part 5 Dayton meeting demo, scope, interoperability

![]() |
| ISA88 Part 5 demonstrations such as this one aim to ensure the models work before they’re made part of the standard. |
Refinement for the line in the sand between ISA88 Part 1 and Part 5

![]() |
| Needed: An interface between recipe control and detailed equipment control. |
The Make2Pack Part 5 effort is focused on the Process/Machine Task Strategy. To understand how that works with the rest of 88 there needs to be an interface between the recipe control (a term not current...Read More
Make2Pack definitions and descriptions for types of control

![]() |
Equipment phase control
Equipment Phase Control is a type of ...Read More
A line in the sand: Equipment Phase

This will include finding an acceptable name and/or definition for the agreed to concept of a procedural entity that is equipment control and not commandable by a recipe, which is what the Make2Pack group has been calling Equipment Sequenced Control. We will continue with the concepts of only three types of Control.
For...Read More
Bigfoot, Lock Ness Monster sighted! Control types

After a recent ...Read More
Upcoming Make2Pack meetings; get involved

OK. You are here. You are interested, I hope. Here are opportunities to become involved and interact with the Make2Pack Working Group.
There are several upcoming events that can provide an opportunity to influence and learn about the evolving Make2Pack ISA SP88 Part 5 effort, in addition to regularly schedule conference calls. (Let me know if you’d like to participate in those, monthly.)
1. The WBF Conference in Philadelphia, March 24-26.
2. The Make2Pack face to face meeting at the Dayton Inter...Read More
A Device is a Device is a Device; But what if it is not?

As the Make2Pack ISA88 Part 5 continues its efforts to bring understanding to the terms and models used in the industry we continue to stumble over the term “Device.” Following is the definition for a device found in the ANSI/ISA–51.1–1979 (R1993) Formerly ANSI/ISA–S51.1–1979 (R1993) standard:
device: An apparatus for performing a prescribed function.
In the ISA88 Part...Read More
Meeting: Replace babble of Control Components with understandable language, OPC help

One of the goals of the Make2Pack ISA88 Part 5 effort is to provide a way for Control Components used in any environment to have a common “language” to the outside world and at the same time allowing control components to use their own “language” internally.
At some point I believe that the babble of internal proprietary communications between control components will be replaced by a universal method of communication. Until then a way to translate to the world outside the language of the proprietary environment is necessary and one of the items to be delivered by the Make2Pack effort.
To help in this effort Thomas Burke of the OPC Foundation has agreed to work with the M...Read More
1000s of solutions to any automation opportunity

As suggested by yesterday's comments, "Machine modes, procedures, execute state," any automation opportunity can have thousands of solutions. One solution applied to packaging machines is the PackML State Model.
The PackML State Model applies to a packaging machine and not a batch unit, as such it uses ISA88 concepts and may not, nor is required to, use all of the ISA88 Batch guidelines as a Batch Unit might. The PackML concept applies to the entire physical machine and its associated control.
PackML's recommendation is that the procedure(s) required to satisfy the intent of the model be separated from the control co...Read More
Machine modes, procedures, execute state

Recent discussions in the committee have included an explanation that there does not have to be a recipe/equipment procedure running when a machine is in the execute state. That is because the Control Component (automated or manual) that manages the Unit/Machine Recipe/Procedure can be used to bring the equipment control to the executing state and the remains active and monitoring the transition rules for the active Recipe/Procedure and stands ready to process any Procedure associated with the needed Operation that the transition rules indicate should become active.
The Control Component that manages the Unit/Machine was activated when the recipe/equipment procedure was selected and stated. Once started it sequences and activates the ordered and referenced operations (Starting, etc. Etc.) per the transition rules.
When the execute state of a machine is achieved th...Read More
It’s elemental Mr. Watson: control system terms

We have been struggling to find terms that can help in describing the modular Hierarchy of Make2Pack. Using Simple and Complex don’t work well as they can be considered by some as insulting and misleading. Last week we started down a path of finding a way to include physical things separate from the control applied to these physical things, and the hornet’s nest was disturbed!
In a discussion with Dr. Ken Ryan [Dr. Kenneth J. Ryan is director, Manufacturing Automation Education Center for Automation and Motion Control at Alexandria Technical College] on how this was accomplished in Mechatroni...Read More
Successful automation implementations

Continuing some thoughts from yesterday ("We need to protect stupid people from doing dumb things"), automation engineers are right that their tools often are sharp and come without handles. This does not mean that handles and protective sheaths can’t be created and made available, though.
Unfortunately, in today’s environment creating these handles and sheaths requires additional effort and cost. Even where some equipment suppliers do provide a form of protection and allow modular automation that can provide access to the pieces and parts, each solution is always very different from all others, and end users find themselves confused and frustrated.
The most successfu...Read More







