Semiotics-based Manufacturing System Integration

The primary intention of this special issue (SI) is to promote semiotics as a candidate framework for a new Manufacturing System Integration (MSI) paradigm. Considering semiotics as an emergent discipline in engineering, there is a question: are there, and (supposing there are) what are the implications of semiotics for the MSI? In other words, could semiotics be a new theoretical, or meta-theoretical, base for the conceptual, theoretical or practical shift in MSI discipline? Or, to be inclusive (or conservative): could semiotics represent an extension of the solution space in conceptual, theoretical, and/or practical terms, for the MSI discipline?

The need for the new MSI paradigm is more and more obvious for several reasons:

1.

There are problems for which the ‘traditional’ approaches, which are based on the semantic field, have no capacity to resolve, referring the problems that lead to the extremely high percentage of ‘failed’ and ‘challenged’ projects, such as the problems of acceptance of the engineering solutions by the clients despite technical correctness of the solutions, not managing incomplete specifications because of not understanding fully the clients' needs, and similar, i.e. not managing the problems in which the root is, in fact, not the technical correctness and/or information transaction but the technical solutions and information use, interpretation and communication.

2.

The growing complexity of the MSI issues, manifested through the growing frequency of emergence of new MSI tools of different kinds, and, consequently the requirements for their faster development and integration with the existing tools – in other words, the growing dynamics of the MSI issues.

Put simply, the primary intention of this SI on ‘Semiotics-based Manufacturing System Integration’ could be understood as ‘opening’ the question on a new paradigm of MSI.

The secondary intention, or more ‘conservatively’ the secondary objective, of this SI is more ‘traditional’: to present some research results on the use of semiotics for MSI. In this respect, this SI comprises 11 papers that present some solutions, results, analyses and approaches that use the semiotics instruments for the improvement of various aspects of MSI. These will be presented in more detail later.

The major question is, what exactly is semiotics?

Semiotics could be seen as a meta-theoretical framework for new research and development of the MSI discipline. In its most simple definition, semiotics is the science of ‘signs’. The signs could be linguistic or non-linguistic. 1 The following two great scientists and thinkers are considered as the ‘fathers’ of semiotics: Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), American logician and founder of pragmatism, and Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), Swiss linguist, the ‘father’ of modern linguistics and structuralism, who laid down independently the basis of semiotics as a science on the transition of the nineteenth to twentieth century.

The domain of semiotics comprises three fields: syntax, semantics and pragmatics. While syntax and semantics are well known in the MSI science, pragmatics is almost totally unknown as a discipline. In a review of the publications in the field of MSI, it was not possible to find any contribution that addresses the pragmatics issues, except for very singular references in a wider context of MSI and without any further elaboration, or presentation, of research results and/or models. However, in the areas of enterprise integration/‘interoperability’ (EI) (not necessarily addressing MSI) and information systems (IS) the situation is relatively different. Considering the extent to which semiotics is used as an instrument in and a meta-model of the science of engineering, the greatest, implying a relevant, extent semiotics achieved was in the area of IS, while in the area of EI the extent of achievement could be said very low, if relevant at all, and in the area of MSI it is practically inexistent. The promotion of semiotics in this SI has a significant success, originating today already a larger community and a greater number of research works and publications.

Semiotics could be seen as having a double relation to the science 2 of MSI: it is both an instrument of MSI and a meta-model of the science of MSI. Semiotics as the instrument of MSI means that the MSI as a discipline uses the models, mechanisms and procedures of semiotics as an independent science for the objective of improvement of the MSI mechanisms, tools and processes. Semiotics as the meta-model, or a meta-theory, of the science of MSI means that semiotics of the actual ‘traditional’ science, or discipline, of MSI is being investigated. From this perspective, semiotics is used as an explanatory and unification framework, or as an ‘organon’, of the sciences in general (Morris 1938), ‘since every science makes use of and expresses its results in terms of signs’, and might be used (as it is still not …) as an explanatory and unification framework, or as an ‘organon’, of the science of MSI.

In this SI, the relation of the MSI to semiotics is primarily instrumental, meaning that semiotics is used as a new instrument for improving MSI science and discipline. This is valid for nine papers while two papers have used semiotics as a perspective for analysing two advanced scenarios of emergent MSI domains.

Of course, the ‘second’ relation between the MSI and the semiotics, i.e. the semiotics of the MSI (whether ‘traditional’ or ‘semiotic’), is expected to be one of the subjects, or even an exclusive subject, of some future SIs.

Now, let me discuss about the papers that are integrated in this SI.

With regard to the semiotics applications in MSI, the papers can be summarised as follows:

Table

Criteria	Value	No. of papers	Paper(s)
Semiotics'	Instrumental	9	1–9
relation to the MSI	Meta-theoretical	2	10–11
Semiotic field	Pragmatics – individual, community	8	1–8
	Pragmatics – society	3 (+2)	9–11 (+4, 6)
Type of	Linguistic	10	1–7, 9–11
signs	Non-linguistic	1 (+1)	8 (+10)

The papers in which the semiotics-based instruments are referred to and/or employed are as follows:

Table

Instrument	Paper(s)
Dialogue	1, 2
Negotiation	1, 3, 7
Pragmatic web	4, 5, 6
Grammar for processing semantic/pragmatic information	4
Virtual world	6
Non-linguistic instruments: continuous improvement areas	8
Social network	4, 6
Institutions	9
Organisational architecture: Open Design	10
Delphi methodology	11

The first paper represents an introductory paper by G.D. Putnik and Z. Putnik, on the semiotics-based MSI concept. The paper presents the findings of an exploratory research on the potential of semiotics for MSI. The findings strongly suggest that semiotics might be the base for a new paradigm of MSI. In the first part, the paper introduces the basic notions of semiotics relevant for the MSI. The second part presents a framework for the semiotics-based MSI and a model of the semiotics-based MSI, called ‘Generative Integration’. In the third part, some experimental set-ups, i.e. prototype demonstrators of the Manufacturing Systems, are presented, as a platform for future research and development of the semiotics-based MSI.

The second paper by F.v. Eijnatten and G.D. Putnik presents the technique of dialogue as an integration mechanism. The paper is expected to be of interest for the readership as it clarifies the differences between the dialogue techniques and the discussion, or argumentation, techniques which are usually confused, leading to inconsistent use of the terms ‘dialogue’ and ‘discussion’ (or ‘argumentation’) and consequently to inconsistent applications of these techniques. In terms of dialogue use in MSI, it is used as a generative integration instrument for the creation of a manufacturing system as a learning organisation and in those organisations looking for the organisational renewal.

The third paper by N. Jing and S. Lu presents collaborative negotiation as another generative integration instrument. Concerning semiotics, the negotiation processes belong to pragmatics, representing a ‘co-construction process’ which is, in fact, a form of integration. On the object-level, the authors present a new framework for improvement of the negotiation processes.

An additionally interesting aspect for the readers, concerning the second paper, is the opportunity to compare the negotiation processes based on argumentation with the dialogue technique (presented in the first paper) and to notice that the use of these two different techniques is justified in the totally different organisational contexts.

In the next paper, A. Zelitchenko presents generative integration instruments on two levels. On the lower level a ‘standard language with formal syntax and informal unlimited vocabulary for the pragmatic description of the projects’, i.e. of the co-operative projects is presented. On the higher level another new MSI instrument is presented: a new type of the social networks named ‘acting social network’, i.e. the social networks that facilitate ‘common action’, contrary to the traditional social networks oriented to facilitation of social communication and exchange of information. The ‘acting social network’ aims to join potential partners in a new-generation of manufacturing systems (the virtual enterprises). The proposed mechanisms imply, actually, an upgrade of the well-known semantic web to the emerging pragmatic web – also virtually a new term for the MSI discipline.

The fifth paper by M. Janssen and R. Feenstra provides a generative integration instrument presenting a service portfolio, as one of the pragmatic web instruments. The service portfolio used communication, synchronisation and generation of meaning among the stakeholders for the purpose of decision making on composition and reconfiguration of manufacturing chains, enabling rapid composition of manufacturing supply chain processes from reusable components. This paper is the second paper that addresses the pragmatic web, through the specific instrument service portfolio, as an MSI semiotic-based instrument.

The paper by L.A. Ripamonti and C.A. Peraboni presents virtual worlds as one of the integration mechanisms. Concretely, the multi-user virtual environments (MUVE) are presented and discussed. This type of mechanism is especially oriented to the integration of (manufacturing) virtual enterprises in which the inherent dynamics of reconfigurations impose higher levels and qualitatively different barriers, such as personality, cultural, language, organisational and physical, for the effective and efficient integration. MUVEs augment the actual lives of their users and support effectively the extension of people's actual social networks, fostering social interaction and knowledge sharing, in fact supporting pragmatic and social levels of the semiotic framework. The MUVEs also present a pragmatic web instrument and in this way, this paper refers to the pragmatic web too.

The seventh paper by B. Providência and J. Ciurana presents how human communication as a generative integration instrument could be integrated with a traditional CAD–Rapid Manufacturing system to create a powerful system for highly personalised product development. In the Guest Editor's opinion, the presented system might represent an initial model of how the traditional manufacturing system too (not only the new manufacturing system structures and tools, such as, e.g. social networks, dialogue, negotiation, pragmatic web, etc.) might be enhanced by using ‘semiotic tools’.

The next paper by J. Andersson Schaeffer, J. Cadavida & T. Backström presents a non-linguistic generative integration instrument. It is the ‘continuous improvement area’. Actually, the paper explores spatial design in continuous improvement areas and also explains how spatial design may hinder or support communication regarding improvements. The semiotic aspects of the spatial design for continuous improvement areas in industry implies a different perspective and includes aspects of cognition, information, communication and treats how and what the elements in the improvement areas communicate. The improvement areas serve as a complement to the integration of manufacturing through computers. Although non-linguistic, the continuous improvement area is considered as a pragmatic-based instrument.

In the paper by F. Romero, a generative integration instrument on a social level is described. This introduces the term ‘institution’, where an ‘institution’ is a socially devised construct. Examples of institutions may include, among others, organisations with educational purposes (schools, universities), economic purposes (firms, trade unions, cooperatives), regulatory purposes (certification organisations, supervising agencies) or political purposes (political parties, government agencies). The paper elaborates the hypothesis on the institutions as the integration instruments through secondary analysis of the literature, and from primary and secondary analyses of case studies, and shows that social factors condition in important ways the shapes and even the possibility of the implementation and integration of manufacturing systems.

The tenth paper by P.J.G. Garrido has used semiotics for analysing the organisational architecture as a generative integration mechanism. Concretely, the organisation of Open Design that originates from the Free Software and Open Source Software organisations is analysed. The generative nature of the Open Design organisational architecture, and the semiotics-based integration instruments, relays in the organisation's openness. From the other side, the organisation's openness implies a kind of an underlying communication and action social network.

In the Guest Editor's opinion, the Open (Design, Manufacturing, etc.) organisational architectures might represent the emergent new generation, and a new paradigm, for manufacturing systems and enterprises. Obviously, these models are intrinsically dependent on the semiotics-based integration paradigm.

In the eleventh and final paper in the issue by R. Jardim-Goncalves, A. Grilo, T. Hassan & A. Steiger-Garção, an analysis is introduced which is based on the organisational semiotics perspective of The European Commission's social-technical study envisioning the single integrated information space, i.e. the Single Electronic Market. The study was grounded at a technological level on the ATHENA framework for systems interoperability, complemented with non-Technological Interoperability Metrics (nT-IM). The paper analyses the vision of stakeholders and discusses the correlation of the technical framework and non-technical interoperability measurement indicators with semiotic levels and theories for MSI, identifying the principal challenges for MSI when characterised by the semiotic levels according to the stakeholders’ recognised issues.

At the end, it is expected that this SI improves this ‘state-of-the-art’, at least to ‘open’ the research that would result in definitive adoption or refutation of semiotics as an instrument of MSI and/or a meta-model of the science of MSI.

There is also a hope that this SI on semiotics will deserve the MSI research community's attention adequate to the great potential of semiotics for the MSI, and for engineering in general.

Acknowledgments

First, our acknowledgments and greatest thanks go to Prof. Stephen Newman, Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing (IJCIM), and Dr. Aydin Nassehi, Managing Editor, for their highest support and professionalism and, more importantly, their highest collaboration, understanding and patience during the development of this SI. We would like to underline Prof. Newman's vision and openness to such an innovative project as this issue intends to be (the readers will judge).

Next, our acknowledgments go to the authors, for their contributions and collaboration and especially to the authors who also served as reviewers, and other reviewers, for their great effort during the review process and for the suggestions they provided to the authors, without which this complex and challenging project would not have been made possible.

Notes

1. For some semioticians, semiotics is a study of non-linguistic signs only. The study of linguistic signs belongs to linguistics as a separate discipline.

2. Paraphrasing Morris (1938) for the purpose of MSI.