Glossary category
Industrial systems, data & AI
Systems and data methods for connected industrial maintenance. All 52 terms are available as direct static HTML links.
- 01
CMMS (Computerized Maintenance Management System)
Software for planning, managing, and documenting operational maintenance work.
→ - 02
EAM (Enterprise Asset Management)
The integrated management of physical assets throughout their complete lifecycle.
→ - 03
AI agent
An AI system that autonomously carries out a sequence of actions toward a goal, rather than only answering a single question.
→ - 04
AI copilot
An AI assistant that supports a human who remains in control, offering suggestions or completing sub-tasks the person directs and reviews.
→ - 05
Anomaly detection
Automated identification of data patterns that deviate from an asset's expected or normal behavior.
→ - 06
Application Programming Interface
A defined interface that lets one software system request data or functions from another in a structured, predictable way.
→ - 07
Artificial intelligence in maintenance
The umbrella application of AI methods (machine learning, generative AI, computer vision, and agents) to industrial maintenance tasks.
→ - 08
Asset Performance Management
A discipline and toolset for continuously evaluating and improving how well physical assets are performing, blending condition, reliability, and risk data.
→ - 09
CANopen
A CAN-bus-based communication protocol for networking industrial controllers and devices, common in machine-level automation.
→ - 10
Cloud computing in maintenance
Processing and storing maintenance data on remote, provider-managed servers accessed over the internet, rather than on local plant hardware.
→ - 11
Computer vision
AI methods that extract information from images or video, such as detecting a defect or reading a gauge automatically.
→ - 12
Condition monitoring
The ongoing collection and review of asset condition data (vibration, temperature, oil, current, and similar signals) used to detect meaningful change.
→ - 13
Data historian
A specialized database that stores time-stamped process and equipment data at high frequency for later retrieval and trend analysis.
→ - 14
Data quality
The degree to which data is accurate, complete, and consistent enough to be trusted for a maintenance decision.
→ - 15
Digital twin
A virtual model of a specific real asset, kept synchronized with its actual condition and behavior through live data.
→ - 16
Distributed Control System
A control architecture that distributes process-control functions across multiple networked controllers, typically for continuous or batch process plants.
→ - 17
Edge computing
Processing data locally, near the equipment that generates it, rather than sending it to a remote server first.
→ - 18
Embeddings
A numeric vector representation of text or content that captures its meaning, allowing similarity to be measured mathematically.
→ - 19
Enterprise Resource Planning
A company-wide system integrating core business processes (finance, procurement, inventory, HR) into one shared platform.
→ - 20
EtherCAT
A high-speed, deterministic Ethernet-based fieldbus protocol optimized for real-time control of many networked devices with minimal delay.
→ - 21
EtherNet/IP
An industrial communication protocol that runs the Common Industrial Protocol over standard Ethernet, widely used in Rockwell Automation environments.
→ - 22
Event log
A time-stamped, system-generated record of technical events (alarms, state changes, faults) captured automatically by equipment or software.
→ - 23
Generative AI
AI models that produce new content (text, images, or summaries) rather than only classifying or predicting from existing data.
→ - 24
Human-Machine Interface
The screen or panel through which a person observes and operates a machine or control system, translating raw data into readable, actionable information.
→ - 25
Industrial Internet of Things
The network of connected sensors and devices on industrial equipment that collect and exchange data over a network, at scale.
→ - 26
Machine learning
A method where a model learns patterns from data, rather than following explicitly programmed rules, to make predictions or classifications.
→ - 27
Machine logbook
An ongoing, running record of day-to-day observations and events on a specific machine, kept by operators and technicians.
→ - 28
Maintenance data model
The formal structure defining how maintenance data objects and their relationships are organized within a system.
→ - 29
Manufacturing Execution System
A system that manages and tracks the execution of production on the shop floor, connecting order-level planning with real-time machine activity.
→ - 30
Master data
The stable, foundational data describing the objects a maintenance system operates on (assets, locations, parts) as distinct from transactional records.
→ - 31
Modbus
A simple, widely adopted serial or Ethernet-based industrial communication protocol for exchanging register-based data between devices.
→ - 32
Motor Current Signature Analysis
A technique that analyzes patterns in a motor's electrical current to detect mechanical and electrical faults without additional sensors on the motor itself.
→ - 33
MQTT
A lightweight publish-subscribe messaging protocol suited to sending small amounts of data efficiently, especially over constrained networks.
→ - 34
Oil analysis
Laboratory or field testing of a lubricant sample to reveal contamination, wear-particle content, and remaining lubricant quality.
→ - 35
OPC UA
A platform-independent, structured industrial data-exchange standard with built-in security and rich information modeling, widely used across manufacturers.
→ - 36
Optical Character Recognition
A specific computer-vision technique that recognizes and extracts text from an image, such as a scanned document or nameplate.
→ - 37
Predictive analytics
Statistical or machine-learning methods that estimate future asset behavior from historical and current data.
→ - 38
PROFIBUS
An established serial fieldbus protocol for connecting industrial controllers, sensors, and drives, predating the shift to Ethernet-based industrial networking.
→ - 39
PROFINET
An Ethernet-based industrial communication standard, the successor to PROFIBUS, widely used particularly in Siemens-centric automation environments.
→ - 40
Programmable Logic Controller
An industrial computer that executes programmed logic to control machinery or a process based on sensor inputs and defined rules.
→ - 41
Retrieval-Augmented Generation
A technique that combines a search step over specific source documents with generative AI, so answers are grounded in verified content.
→ - 42
Sensor fusion
Combining data from multiple different sensor types into a single, more reliable assessment than any one sensor could provide alone.
→ - 43
Speech-to-text
AI methods that convert spoken language into written text, such as transcribing a hands-free field report.
→ - 44
Structured data
Data organized according to a predefined, explicit schema (fixed fields and types) making it directly queryable and analyzable.
→ - 45
Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition
A system that monitors and enables supervisory control of equipment and processes, often spread across a wide geographic area, from a central interface.
→ - 46
System integration
The overall project and work of connecting multiple separate systems so they function together as one consistent workflow.
→ - 47
Thermography
A non-contact inspection technique that captures a thermal image of a component or system to reveal abnormal heat patterns.
→ - 48
Time-series data
A sequence of measured values, each tied to a specific timestamp, used to observe how a quantity changes over time.
→ - 49
Ultrasound inspection
A technique that detects high-frequency sound produced by friction, leaks, or electrical discharge, inaudible to the human ear.
→ - 50
Unstructured data
Content without a predefined schema (free-text notes, images, or PDF documents) requiring further processing to extract usable information.
→ - 51
Vector database
A database specialized for storing embeddings and quickly finding the closest matches by semantic similarity rather than exact keyword match.
→ - 52
Vibration analysis
The interpretive method of extracting frequency content from measured vibration data to diagnose the specific mechanical condition causing it.
→