Computers Chemical Engineering Vol. , o. , pp. 48-91, 1983 009~1354/83 3.00 + .OO
Printed in reat Britain. Q 1983 Perqmon Press Ltd.

COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY IN PROCESS SYSTEMS ENGINEERING

R. L. Motard

Department of Chemical Engineering, Washington University

St. Louis, Missouri, 63130 USA

Abstract. This paper looks at the future of computer aided process systems
engineering. Productivity issues are discussed with respect to software,
computer design technology, engineering relational data base management
systems, and data independent programming. Very large systems integration
technology will have a major impact on the structure of process systems
engineering software. Standards are proposed for host languages and host
operating systems. Expert systems will find an increasing role.

Keywords. Software, very large scale integration, data base management

systems, computer aided design, expert systems.

INTRODUCTION density of imperfections, which in turn

In the past 15 years chemical engineers
have experienced a minor revolution in the
practice of process systems engineering due
to the expanding role of computer tech-
nology. It is difficult to discuss the
past successes of computer applications to
our field when one is so aware of the tre-
mendous promises of the future. This
paper will emphasize primarily the future
as an evolution from the past
We have all read the projections of poten-
tial increases in packing density of com-
puter and memory silicon chips, in antici-
pation of hardware cost reduction. As of
1982 we are told that memory chips may
ultimately reach a density of 1 - 10
megabytes per chip versus 256K today.
Microprocessor chips are now being
ed with a half million transistors
reach 2 - 10 million transistors before
1990. At some point silicon technology
will reach its limit and the historical
trends in computer prices will bottom out.
Currently, the semiconductor industry is
still projecting a 15% per year
cost/performance of large scale
purpose machines and 25% per year for
small-scale general purpose machines, ex-
pressed in $/million-instructions-per-
second (Branscomb 1982). The limit of
silicon technology will probably be reached
within the next few years. Where it
bottoms out depends on the ability of
silicon substrate manufacturers to produce
ultrapure silicon economically. This is a
chemical engineering problem in its own
right. The ability to shrink electronic
elements and their interconnections onto
silicon is critically dependent on the
affects the yield of acceptable chips in
mass production.
The packing density of circuit elements on
a chip is only one of the factors affect-
ing cost. There are engineering problems
associated with the integration of these
devices into working computers. The
energy dissipated must be removed by suit-
able packaging. The design of very large
and present. scale integrated (VLSI) elements is so
complex that progress is keyed to the
development of computer aided design tools.
Typically, (LaBrecque 19821, a micro-
electronic system design begins with a
system architect who produces a block
diagram meeting the functional requirements.
A logic designer translates the block
diagram into logic and gate specifications.
develop- A circuit designer then produces circuit
and may diagrams from these specifications. A lay-
out designer places the circuit diagrams
onto a silicon chip and a draftsman pre-
pares the masks from which the chip will
be manufactured. The process of digital
system design certainly has its analog in
decrease in the process systems engineering enterprise.
general Obviously, the cost of design must be con-
sidered. In today's economy, with state-
of-the-art design technology, the design
of a new chip will cost $1 million for
simple devices and up to $20 million for
complex microprocessor chips. The semi-
conductor industry today is forced to manu-
facture in very large volumes to recover
the high cost of design and the high cost
of equipment to manufacture high-density
devices. New technologies such as optical
electronic digital systems promise further
reductions in hardware size, and biocom-
puters, now only a gleam in the biotech-
nologist's eye, may eventually reduce

484
*'electronic" elements to molecular scale.
However, any displacement of silicon tech-
nology will have to challenge the inertia
that an entrenched, mature and ultra-re-
fined technology acquires in the industry.
All of this progress in miniaturization
serves to aggravate the two main problems
impeding further progress, namely software
and design technology.
THE SOFTWARE PROBLEM
The development of information systems of
interest to process systems engineers is
critically dependent on the availability of
software. While hardware cost is decreas-
ing a million-fold between 1955 and 1985,
programmer productivity will increase only
by a factor of 4 (Birnbaum 1982). Another
view of the software problem is offered by
the observation that in 1985 the cost
leasing 1 million instructions per second
of hardware capability will fall below the
salary of a professional programmer for the
same period of time (Branscomb 1982).
Programming costs now approach 85% of total
user costs for a functioning computer
facility.
The key to future progress in the growth of
computer use is programmer productivity.
This can happen in several ways. For in-
stance, the availability of personal
microcomputers has spawned a cottage
gramming industry, with new software
products capturing surprising market
in unexpected ways. Two examples of the
latter are VISICALC, a financial spread
sheet planning tool which has become a
standard personal computer package from
very modest beginnings. CP/M, the standard
operating system for zilog's ~80 micro-
processor has had a similar history.
Further improvements in programming pro-
ductivity depends on three developments
(Bacon 1982): 1) Software building,blocks
for building system software 2) Software
development tools and methods, and 3) Higher
levels of abstraction in program-forming
operations with strong algebraic properties.
Engineers will accept as fundamental
philosophy that an inventory of standard
parts with suitable interface disciplines
between them can be the basis for composing
more complex programs. Because the parts
would be rigorously verified and tested,
high quality programs might be quickly
assembled. This has been successful in
application programming but not in systems
software. There are two problems, namely
determining the right set of standard
blocks and providing a proper environment
for their interconnection. Nevertheless,
microprocessor operating systems are now
being provided in read only memory ROM)
chip sets (Lettieri 1982). Some are hard-
ware dependent but others are processor-
independent, requiring only a few external
parameters such as a user-supplied con-
R L MOTARD
483 figuration table to establish the inter-
face with the application environment.
They supply well-established functions
which don't require modification from one
system to another. Typically, a silicon-
based operating system adds 20 or more
high-level instructions to the basic in-
struction set of the microcomputer.
Peripheral software routines will also
allow operating system calls from higher
level languages like PASCAL. Software-in-
silicon is currently a marketing strategy,
allowing hardware manufacturers to enter
the very large value-added market in soft-
ware. Nevertheless, interest will grow,
quality will improve, and it is possible
to speculate that the range of such
products will grow to include telecommuni-
cation functions, networking functions,
high-level language compilers, graphics
functions and other application programs.
of
Software development tools and methodology
is another productivity factor. These im-
provements in software production result in
part from a decomposition of the develop-
ment process and in part from the availa-
bility of management procedures. Invari-
ably the development sequence involves a
layering of languages and a collection of
utility programs. For example, the porta-
bility of the UNIX operating system
(Kernighan and Morgan 1982) to diverse
hardware systems is greatly enhanced be-
pro- cause UNIX was written in the C language
(Kernighan and Ritchie 1978), a lower-level
shares system development language. C is a
machine-dependent language with machine
dependencies carefully tailored to be
adaptable to a universe of machine archi-
tectures, and restricted to about 5% of the
compiler code. The UNIX part is invariant,
and all one needs is a C compiler for the
target machine, itself written in C. The
portability of PASCAL depends on the avail-
ability of a p-code interpreter for the
target machine since PASCAL is compiled
to p-code. Again the PASCAL part is in-
variant, and the interpreter to implement
p-code interpretation or translation is far
easier to do quickly and correctly as a
lower level machine-dependent language.
the Among the other tools that complete the
development process we include special
journalizing editors, source-language-level
debuggers, documentation facilities, specia
linkers, and compilation and configuration
databases. The management of large soft-
ware projects is further enhanced by such
automated tools as formal specification and
design languages, text managers (filing
systems), configuration managers, test data
generators, flow analyzers, etc.(Howden 198:
Program forming operations are inhibited
today by our inability to construct
programs in terms which fit the problem
rather than at the detail required
for the machine to implement the functions
associated with the problem (Bacon 1982).

Computer technology in process systems engineering
There is need for further research on the
development of programming languages with
strong algebraic properties relating
primitive functions of the language.
strong program-forming operations a
rigorous approach might be found for build-
ing new programs from old ones. The prin-
cipal barrier to these developments is the
architecture of existing computers which
force each program to be concerned with the
detailed assignment and manipulation of
storage. This leads to inconsistent views
of data. There may be some relief in sight
due to the increasing interest in relation-
al data base management systems which offer
data independent programming environments,
a subject to be discussed later.
COMPUTER DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
We have already discussed the shrinking
size of circuit elements on silicon chips.
There are two advantages of shrinking
transistors on chips (LaSrecque 1982).
They switch faster and consume less energy.
Reducing the linear dimension of a tran-
sistor element by 2 increases the packing
density 4-fold and switching speed is
doubled, a substantial increase in com-
puting power. But, the increasing com-
plexity of very large scale integrated
(VLSI) circuits poses another problem in
productivity whose solution has substantial
implications for process systems engineer-
ing.
As circuit elements become smaller and
faster, cross-chip communication delay
becomes a bottleneck. Most of the energy
consumed in chips is in communication and
the wires take up 95% of the chip area as
well. The basic von Neumann architecture
of computers consisting of one memory, one
input channel, one output channel and one
processor makes computation a single,
sequential process. This poses serious
difficulties in harnessing the technology
of VLSI and perhaps offers an opportunity
to redefine the architecture of computing
systems. Architectural issues involve two
approaches to decomposition in computation.
One approach is to break up the process
into independent or parallel parts which
can be performed concurrently in ensembles
of small processors. Another approach is
to use systolic arrays, the so-called data
flow machines, in which the data flows
rhythmically through several simple com-
putational cells before it returns to
memory. Arrays, which are either linear
or two-dimensional, can achieve higher
degrees of parallelism. Data may flow in
an array at multiple speeds and in multi-
ple directions. The key to parallel decom-
position or array decomposition of compu-
tational tasks is to find the appropriate
regularity in the application problems to
be solved. Each problem would have its own
special-purpose machine, with VLSI chips
designed to do exactly what people want
done. It is the only way to truly harness
the power of VLSI and avoid the cross-chip
the communication dilemmna.
With
The dawn of powerful special-purpose
machines will require computer aids to
assist the computer architect to divide
problem-oriented computation into subunits.
What better opportunity for process
systems engineers to become engaged in the
design of computer architectures specifi-
cally implemented to solve chemical pro-
cess design problems? There are a host of
questions to be addressed, all with the
objective of casting process analysis,
design and simulation into silicon. The
use of chemical engineers in this fashion
is not as far-fetched as it may seem.
Carver Mead of Caltech and Lynn Conway of
Xerox have designed a one semester graduate
course which teaches graduate students with
backgrounds typical of computer science
rather than electrical engineering how to
design VLSI chips. Such backgrounds would
not be foreign to engineers from disci-
plines other than electrical engineering.
The entire process can be automated like a
computer aided design project and produces
chip designs only slightly less optimal
than those produced by experts in a very
short time, compared to the many man-
months required when done by traditional
methods. The entire approach is bound to
be synergistic as new special-purpose chip
designs are produced which assist in the
design of new VLSI systems. One such
development is a geometry engine contain-
ing a half million transistors which per-
forms VLSI circuit layout. Indeed it is
thought that the entire VLSI process can
be automated, between a behavioral descrip-
tion of the computational problem and a
set of circuit masks. Prototype software
and hardware systems now produce chips with
20 to 30% more area than optimal designs.
Once the circuit masks are available there
are any number of resource centers in the
US which can deliver the actual VLSI cir-
cuit in four to six weeks. The key to
such design productivity is computer aided
design and a well-structured design tech-
nology. The economic conditions which
dictated high volume production of chips
disappear when the cost of design is
radically deflated. Short run production
of special purpose computers designed for
process engineering tasks become econo-
mically feasible.
DATA MANAGEMENT
Having briefly reviewed some of the hard-
ware issues and related problems, we have
raised some questions about data organi-
zation forced on the software developer by
a universal dependence on von Newmann com-
puter architecture. There are two solution:
to this problem, one involving software and
the other, hardware. The first is easily
perceived but the latter only dimly. Let

CACE
us Vol. , o.
first -s
approach the problem of data
a software solution.
The history of computer aided design
process systems engineering has been one of
proliferation of individual engineering
computer programs. Communication among
these stand-alone aids for the engineering
process has not been solved satisfactorily.
Most chemical engineers involved in process
engineering are familiar with programs for
process synthesis, process design, process
simulation, process optimization, reactor
and fractionator design, physical property
estimation, heat exchanger and vessel de-
sign, piping design, inventory and project
control, bill of materials take-off and
automated drafting. The entire mix takes
on the aspect of an unmanageable complex of
activities and resources to the average
project manager, who must meet ever more
critical deadlines on project completion
with rapidly escalatinq costs of execution
and delays.
These problems are created by a program-
centered approach to large-scale computer
applications. In the past, the program and
its developer occupied the core of the
application process. The data were given a
secondary role in the development and
management of such engineering applications
of computers. Most of the development
effort was devoted to the program, and its
elegance. NO great attention was paid to
the value of the data in itself. Indeed
most of the data ended up as a pile of com-
puter printouts.
The solution to this complex problem is to
adopt a data-centered development approach.
The data are put at the core of the
application process, hence the emphasis on
data base management. After all, it is the
data that become information and decision-
making depends on information; only second-
arily on computer programs. The business
community discovered long ago that their
daily activities could not depend on pro-
gram-centered management. The engineering
community must now seriously consider the
movement to data base management system
(DBMS) technology to survive the complexity
problem.
The first goal of data base management soft-
ware is to decouple programs from data (Codd
1982). As we have said earlier, the barrier
to strong program forming operations is a
concern for the detailed assignment and
manipulation of storage in individual pro-
grams. The decoupling of data makes the
development of data independent programming
conceivable. Today's problem with software
is the high maintenance cost of application
programs, much of it due to the close coupl-
ing of data and programs. Every small
change in data structure, as each application
grows in sophistication and complexity,
triggers a chain reaction of programming
changes to maintain the viability of exist-
R L MOTARD
from ing programs. Large changes in data
structures generate large reprogramming
projects. Not only is maintenance reduced
in but data independent programming should be
much more productive once the techniques
are mastered.
The first step in data decoupling is to
isolate the programmer from the data
storage model. This is achieved by re-
placing positional addressing with asso-
ciative addressing. The programmer need
stored or indeed if storage has been re-
organized. His principal concerns are the
associative relations among data, whether
data are conceptually related on a one-to-
many' or many-to-many level. He retrieves
or stores data via a relation name (or
entity name), attribute name and attribute
value (or key). Typically,
Value + Attribute (Entity)
such as,
1OO'C + Temperature (Stream 5)
In a truly relational data environment fur-
ther data, decoupling takes place between
the user (logical level) and the program
(conceptual level). There is thus a
three-level description of data, the
storage level description being hidden from
the programmer, the storage and conceptual
levels being hidden from the user. The
user interface is a set of commands which
can be used for entering data, executing
application programs and generating re-
ports.
The relational DBMS is an interface program
between the applications and the data. It
has its own data sublanguaqe permitting the
insertion, deletion, retrieval and update
of data along with data definition
facilities. It must permit algebraic set
operations without resorting to iteration
or recursion. A complete relational
algebra is derivable from SELECT, PROJECT
and JOIN operators. Relational processing
treats whole relations as operands, avoid-
ing loops as we have said. In analyzing
the operations it is convenient to think
of relations as tables with tuples
(collections of attribute values) as rows
and the attributes themselves as columns:
Tuples are not position sensitive in the
tabular concept.
The SELECT operator takes one relation as
operand and produces a new relation (table)
consistinq of selected tuples (rows) of the
first. The PROJECT operator also transform
one relation into a new one, this time con-
sisting of selected attributes (columns)
of the first. The JOIN operator takes two
relations (tables) as operands and pro-
duces a third relation consisting of the
rows of the first concatenated with the
rows of the second, but only where speci-
 

Computer technology in process systems engineering 487

fied columns (attributes) of the first have eliminates the need for coding and recod-
matching values with specified columns of ing of data from one phase of process en-
the second. The JOIN operator may or may gineering to the next. It promotes
not remove redundancy in columns (attri- efficient project management. When coupled
butes). The DBMS must support tables (re- to non-procedural command languages it pro-
lations), without user-visible navigation vides an electronic filing cabinet and an
links between them. The system provides electronic scratchpad. Process problems
the automatic navigation. can be solved incrementally, bit by bit,
working on one part of the project at a
In order to be useful to the process system time without sacrificing the coherence re-
engineering program developer, the data quired for the overall project. Discipline
sublanguage must be usable in two modes specialists can be alerted to design de-
(1) Interactively at a terminal and (2) cision changes as they occur, without the
Embedded in an application program written delay inherent in bureaucratic organi-
in a host language such as FORTRAN or zations. Reports can be generated in
PASCAL. Thus, application programmers can timely fashion. There is no need to stock-
separately debug at a terminal the database pile massive computer printouts, since a
operations that they wish to incorporate in new report can be tailored and produced as
their application programs, then embed the needed. Such a system can really become a
same statements in the host language to computer aid to the designer, supporting
complete the application program, rather than inhibiting experimentation and
case studies, continuously recording the
Beyond these simple ideas the complete DBMS data traffic in short or long computer
must provide the following services (Codd terminal sessions, filing multiple
1982): examples, and supporting a framework for
transmitting large volumes of system docu-
1. Data storage, retrieval and update mentation when coupled to a text process-
ing capability.
2. A user-accessible catalog of data de-
scriptions (schemas of relations and Data independent programs allow the con-
attributes) struction of ever more powerful and com-
plex process systems engineering resources.
3. Transaction support to monitor changes With regard to hardware solutions, relation-
in databases al DBMS offer great decomposition flexi-
bility when planning a distributed network
4. Recovery services in case of failure at of computer systems and great recomposition
the program, system or hardware level power for dynamic recombination of decen-
tralized information. Workstation-style
5. Concurrency control approaches to large scale design projects
become the natural mode of execution. As
6. Authorization services to ensure that
access and manipulation of data is con- local computing power will become available
trolled at both the user and program level at the engineer's desk. Network communi-
cation and DBMS will provide the under-
7. Integration with data communication pinning which makes the synergism between
services the engineer and the machine complete.
There are unresolved problems in process
8. Integrity services to ensure that data- systems DBMS. Very large data collections
base states and changes of state conform to lead to slow storage and retrieval. In a
specified rules. typical chemical process capital project,
it is estimated that there are one to two
Obviously, such extensive services makes gigabytes (109 bytes) of data per billion
the operation of the DBMS somewhat depend- dollars of plant investment (Perris 1981).
ent on a host operating system. Whether Such estimates have led some to speculate
one can offer such services irrespective that a complete process engineering data
of the operating system, thereby making base would be composed of separate data
the DBMS much more portable, is a question bases for each discipline (Cherry, Grogan,
for the future. Knapp and Perris 1982). Some manufacturers
are now offering data base machines which
We have stated that DBMS-based process accelerate the searching of disc files for
systems engineering separates data from data retrieval. What shape future hardware
programs. This leads to the survivability will take in the face of large data managed
of programs, data-independent programming, projects is a matter of speculation.
much lower maintenance costs for application
software, and much higher application pro- Host Language and Operating System
gramming productivity. What else does it
promise? Does it enhance the productivity Since we have alluded to host language and
of the chemical engineer? The answer is host operating systems in DBMS technology
that it does, in several ways. it is time that we say a few words about
the future of both. In our opinion,
In the first place, DBMS technology supported by our perception of widespread

R L
interest in the matter, a language like
PASCAL and its offspring ADA, will become
the process systems engineering computer
language of the future. FORTRAN has served
us well over two decades and successive
generations of the language have enhanced
FORTRAN with features to be found in a more
integrated environment in PASCAL. PASCAL
is a well-structured language, with a sim-
plicity which enhances its ability to de-
tect programming errors. It encourages the
creation of portable programs, and modular
programs. PASCAL as a language is easy to
read and write, therefore programs are easy
to maintain. It is a language in which re-
strictions have been introduced intention-
ally in order to reduce the number of de-
cisions, hence the number of errors which
a programmer makes. ADA, which has its
roots in PASCAL, is the result of a s-year
effort on the part of the United States
Department of Defense to define a universal
system development language. While there
have been some reservations about various
features of ADA which lack clear and pre-
cise definition or implementability, the
international resources behind its develop-
ment will ultimately insure that a viable
version of the ADA language will survive.
PASCAL and ADA incorporate the work of
early research on the properties of pro-
gramming languages that help eliminate
common coding errors. These allow the
language to enforce assertions about the
range of variables and other properties.
These features provide a formal approach to
verifying that the programs match the intent
of the designer.
We are not proposing that all old programs
be discarded. Certainly, it is possible
to link PASCAL and FORTRAN routines. In a
DBMS environment, old FORTRAN programs with
data allocation and conventional input-
output statements stripped out and replaced
by DBMS access statements can easily be in-
tegrated into new computing environments.
All new developments however should be based
on PASCAL/ADA.
Operating systems and DBMS are difficult to
disentangle. Nevertheless, one should
examine the evolving area of operating
systems to identify any movements toward
standardization. We have said earlier that
this is important from the point of view
of acquiring well-tested building blocks.
It is also important for the future movement
into ROM-based, software-in-silicon operat-
ing systems and programs. If there is one
candidate which is emerging as the industry
standard in this area it is the UNIX operat-
ing system developed in the early 1970's at
Bell Laboratories. Perhaps with somewhat
less conviction we anticipate that all
future operating systems will be similar to
UNIX, especially in the type of workstations
that will be used by process systems en-
gineers.
MOTARD
UNIX
UNIX (Kernighan and Morgan 1982) is funda-
mentally a single user operating system,
although it is available on multiuser
systems. Without marketing impetus, it
has grown to 3000 systems world-wide ex-
cluding microcomputer sites. It is now
available on most major computing machines.
It is basically an electronic filing
system. All files are treated merely as a
stream of characters (or bytes) with no
reference to hardware device character-
istics such as tracks, cylinders or blocks
that typify other commercial operating
systems. Associated with files is a
hierarchy of directories which contain
information about other directories or
about files which helps to organize large
collections of files. Input or output de-
vices are handled in the same way as
ordinary files, with the application pro-
gram being unaware of either the source or
destination of the data.
UNIX is a multitasking system which means
that a user may have several processes (or
tasks) executing concurrently. Task schedu
ing is handled by the system kernel which
also manages data storage. In addition to
a repository of utility programs available
to the kernel, the system is controlled by
a command interpreter called the shell.
The shell accepts commands and interprets
them as requests to run programs. Commands
may be pipelined to connect programs. For
instance, the command
program < datalplot
will tell the system to run "program" using
a data file called "data" for input and to
connect the output to a program called
"plot".
program < data > lpr
would direct "program" output to a line
printer. If data smoothing is required
before plotting,
program C data)spline)plot
would achieve the desired result. Provided
a family of development tools is available,
it is possible to write complex systems
without ever using a programming latiguage.
Even the shell is a program and the command
sh < comds
causes the shell to take its commands from
file "cmds".
The value of UNIX as a very high level
system building environment results from
the decoupling of data and programs. The
uniform file interface promotes this. In
addition, the use of shell scripts and
pipelines promotes extensive modularity.
The modularity in turn promotes great
 

Computer technology in process systems engineering 489

flexibility and evolutionary changes. UNIX or engineering enterprise being localized

can be tailored to a wide diversity of in Yokohama, London or Los Angeles will no
environments. Another virtue of UNIX is longer be relevant. Task forces of people
its small size and clean structure which will be brought together through tele-
makes it very popular in university computer communication on a global basis.
science departments. It is spawning a whole
cottage industry of UNIX-based programs and The VSLI age will provide affordable
systems. Since the source code is dis- graphic processors, color raster scan de-
tributed with the system it continues to vices with 1024 x 1024 pixel resolution
gain in popularity. It has been adapted will grace every engineering office. These
to the new generation of 16-bit and 32-bit will be tied to very powerful virtual
computer chips. microcomputers allowing the engineer to
communicate with process engineering soft-
UNIX has found broad application in text ware via an electronic sketchpad. Super
processing, software development, laboratory computers capable of 100 million in-
automation, information systems involving struction executions per second will be
small databases and computer science edu- available at distributed service centers.
cation. A commercial relational database Nevertheless, a great deal of the compu-
system called INGRES is now available with tation load will be local, using parallel
a UNIX interface (Weiss 1982). UNIX is as processing and data flow hardware.
yet not suitable for real-time systems,
database systems handling large volumes of
on-line transactions, or for non-programmers SOFTWARE FOR PROCESS
(although a PASCAL/UNIX interface is now SYSTEMS ENGINEERING
available).
We have discussed the host language for pro-
cess systems engineering (PASCAL/ADA) and
HARDWARE FOR PROCESS SYSTEMS the host operating system (UNIX prototype).
ENGINEERING We have made a case for data-independent
programming through the use of the engineer-
From the foregoing, it is obvious that we ing DBMS. It now remains to anticipate the
expect the computer technology of the future of application software in process
future to be distributed in architecture systems engineering.
with a great many opportunities for custom-
izing to the application. The late 1980's Process design software of the future will
will signal the dawn of the VLSI era, be highly modular, data-independent,
supported by computer aided design. In- strongly structured for maintainability in
stead of merely replicating the von Neumann the modern software engineering sense, and
structures of the past in cheaper and faster supported on both personal workstations
circuit elements, we will see new boundaries and larger host machines through network-
between hardware and software. Current ing. This software will be integrated into
hardware technology is simply the lowest a hardware-software complex making liberal
common denominator of machines with general use of building-block architecture and con-
purpose application. New special purpose taining some VLSI subsystems in silicon
hardware will be plug-compatible with (ROM) for such activities as operating
traditional computers, software-in-silicon system kernel, graphics engines, compiler
operating systems, intelligent terminals, engines, relational database engines, and
microcomputers, graphics systems, printers possibly intermediate level operations of
and peripheral memory devices. chemical process design in ROM.

Design reports will be prepared from en- As examples of the latter we propose the
gineering data bases edited on text-or word- possibility that physical property opera-
processing machines, typeset if necessary tions, and two-and three-phase determi-
and transmitted over broadband telecommuni- nation routines would be available in ROM.
cation systems. The communication systems Another silicon engine might handle all
of the world will consist of local and scalar-vector, vector-vector, and vector-
global connections, combining voice, data, matrix operations using pipelined (systolic)
message and video modes. Local networks array processor technology. At this point
will support a great array of printing it is useful to consider whether complex
modules, distributed computing power, data process design procedures would be coded in
storage modules, etc. New and cheaper a conventional procedural language or in an
large scale data storage media such as interpretive command language like the UNIX
videodiscs will quickly assimilate whole shell language. One can at least surmise
libraries of instructional materials, re- that a command language layer will be the
ports, and design data. Access to the net- standard user interface. Graphical inter-
work will take place at home, factory, or faces will be used interchangeably with
office. Local networks will be ported to command languages. Beneath the user inter-
national and international networks via face one could have a hybrid of procedural
television cable and space satellites. routines and interpreted, non-procedural,
Not only will the computing power be dis- problem-oriented languages with the inter-
tributed but the notion of an industrial preter residing in ROM. With data-
 

490 R L MOTARD

independent programming any mix of old and EXPERT SYSTEMS

new process design modules can be assembled
into a complex program using shell language Having established a viewpoint about com-
pipelines and scripts. Alternatively, as puter technology developments as an aid to
is the option with DBMS, the user might wish process engineers, it now remains to
to carry on a piecemeal interaction with stretch our conception to the limit. Where
process models making use of the high does the interface between man and machine
modularity of the environment. fall in the future? We are not so concern-
ed about ergonomics and user friendliness
The architecture of process flowsheeting in this instance but about the computer
systems will need to be redefined to fit system as a "knowledge" base. At what
the computer technology of the future. In point does the software transcend the
one respect at least, flowsheeting packages analytical or algorithmic boundary and be-
will be more simple to construct. They come a synthetic problem solver, a true
will no longer be built with internal data tool for the human mind?
storage manipulation. MIT-ASPEN, which will
become the U.S. industrial standard in the Those of us who have studied process
near future, will be the last generation of synthesis in its various parts have some
stand-alone flowsheeting systems. The final experience with knowledge bases. However,
generation will be data-based. In another our most important successes, as Allen
respect one will be considering new program Newell (1981) has emphasized, have been in
architectures, divorced from data manage- problem areas that yield to a uniformity
ment, which lend themselves to different of representation such as heat exchanger
forms of partitioning to harness the power networks and unintegrated distillation
of innovative or non-von Neumann hardware sequences for sharp separations. Sub-
structures. Partitions which support stantial progress has also been made in
parallel processing and data flow process- certain applications of computer search
ing will evolve. methods to problems in organic synthesis.
Again a uniform representation is already
We have traditionally been burdened with available in the classical structural model
the dichotomy between equation-oriented and of organic chemical molecules. Other areas
simultaneous modular flowsheeting systems, of chemical process knowledge may ultimate-
with a spectrum of alternatives in between. ly yield to uniform representation and
Such distinctions will begin to blur in the thereby uniform procedures but, by and
new technology. A hierarchy of approaches large, the most important knowledge namely,
will be executable on the same process problem-specific knowledge, is non-uniform.
models. At one level, the user will be One alternative (Stephanopoulos, Linnhoff
able to use the simplest kind of sequential and Sophos 1982) is to decompose the
models for process synthesis and screening problem into uniform domains as has recent-
of alternative flowsheets. At another ly been proposed for energy integrated
level the model might be used as input to sharp distillation sequences. The best
a hybrid equation-solving approach, con- unintegrated sequences turn out to be the
taining both equations and conventional best candidates for integration; a happy
discrete process modules. At a third result.
level, simultaneous modular architectures
might be used interchangeably on the same As process engineers we see the benefits
process model to optimize the process of artificial intelligence and expert
according to infeasible path algorithms systems in assisting us to invent chemical
now under development(Biegler and Hughes 19E11). processing structures. Once a complete
structure is provided by the initial
Until data management is fully developed structuring heuristics we are confident of
the DBMS environment will have to accommo- our ability to analyze the design, to
date hybrid environments where substantial optimize it, and to identify its weaker
data banks of evaluated experimental characteristics. From this knowledge one
thermopbvsical data in traditional file can then improve the structure, using
and record form coexist with relational evolutionary rules. One school of thought
data bases. Data preprocessing will pro- prefers to keep the rules simple for train-
vide for a rational preparation of the pro- ing purposes and for easy application using
cess model with respect to physical data pencil and paper. However, there is ample
in a natural manner, generating VLE corre- scope for improving the simple logic of
lations, etc. The same can be said of expert procedures using computer-based
other forms of tabular data normally ex- expert systems. In a computer environment
tracted from handbooks and design manuals one can provide access to a broader know-
ultimately residing on laser optical video- ledge base of physical and chemical be-
discs, with anticipated recording densities havior of chemical species and their mix-
of 3 gigabytes per side, or 750,000 pages tures. The challenge for chemical en-
of text on one side of a randomly accessible gineers is to encode chemical process
optical disc (Goldstein 1982). knowledge in a form that is suitable for
decision making. The difficulty is that
in integrated networks of chemical process-
ing units decisions have both a local and
 

Computer technology in process systems engineering 49

a global impact. So, as the application of Goldstein, Charles M. (1982). Optical Disk
expert programming matures we will see a Technology and Information. Science, 215
growing emphasis on adaptive learning pro- 862-868.
cedures drawn from the field of artificial
intelligence. Howden, William E. (1982). Contemporary
Software Development Environment. comm.
Much has been made of the ability of sym- ACM 25_ 318-329.
bolic manipulation systems
in artificial in-
telligence, or interactiveproblem solving. Kernighan, Brian W. and Dennis M. Ritchie
In our field I see this as only a super- (1978). The C Programming Language,
ficial veneer since so much of our knowledge PrenticeLHall, Englewood Cliffs, New
base requires intensive computation to ex- Jersey.
tract meaningful information. Every sensi-
tive variable must be evaluated in the con- Kernighan, Brian W. and Samuel P. Morgan
text of mixture-dependent properties, (1982). The UNIX Operating System: A
every reaction phenomenon is environmen- Model for Software Design. Science, 215,
tally dependent. The expert systems of 779-783.
chemical engineering will have to be support-
ed by substantial computation and pure list LaBrecque, Mort (1982). Faster Switches,
processing languages alone will not do. Smaller Wires, Larger Chips. MOSAIC,
Nevertheless, the evolution of relational Jan/Feb, National Science Foundation,
data management systems, of VLSI engines Washington, D.C. pp. 26-32.
tuned to the relational and computational
algebra of chemical processing environments, Lettieri, Larry (1982). Software-in-
and of multi-mode flowsheeting systems will Silicon Boosts System Performance, Cuts
raise exciting opportunities for configur- Programming Time. Mini-Micro Systems,
ing new processing complexes with computer March, 93-95.
aids.
Newell, Allan (1981). How to View the
Progress in problem solving by computer may Computer. In R. S. H. Mah and W. D. Seider
come from an unexpected source. The pro- (Eds.1, Foundations of Computer Aided
liferation of recreational software in video Process Design, Vol.l, American Institute
and computer games (Bimbaum 1982) may spill of Chemical Engineers, New York. pp. l-25.
over into the computer aided design sector.
These AI-based procedures already incor- Perris, F. A. (1981). Imperial Chemical
porate limited natural language under- Industries, Ltd. Personal Communication.
standing, common-sense knowledge bases, and
non-trivial simulations of human reasoning. Stephanopoulos, George, B. Linnhoff and
A. Sophos (1982). Synthesis of Heat In-
tegrated Distillation Sequences. Under-
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