Manufacturing backup system

Details Manufacturing backup system Manufacturing backup system

1998-05-04

2001-04-10

Grant, William (Department: 2786)

Data processing: generic control systems or specific application

Generic control system, apparatus or process

Having protection or reliability feature

C700S121000, C714S004110

Reexamination Certificate

active

06216051

ABSTRACT:

FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to manufacturing systems and more particularly to semiconductor processing manufacturing systems.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It is known to control manufacturing systems such as semiconductor processing manufacturing systems with computers. Because of the magnitude of information that is necessary to control these systems as well as the distance between devices which are controlled, these systems are generally controlled by mainframe computers.
For example, referring to
FIG. 1
(Prior Art), one such semiconductor processing system
10
uses mainframe
11
which is coupled to a plurality of gates
12
, e.g., system network architecture (SNA) gateways available from Novell™ Corporation of Provo, Utah under the trade designation 3270. Gates
12
are coupled to respective routers
13
to provide separate segments of system
10
. The segments are coupled via backbone bus
15
.
A plurality of gates
12
are coupled to a respective plurality of communication terminals (CT)
14
which are in turn coupled to the actual semiconductor processing manufacturing devices (MD)
16
. The communication terminals
14
and manufacturing devices
16
located between each gate
12
and router
13
provide separate processing portions
18
.
Additionally, a gate
12
is coupled to stocker portion
20
of semiconductor processing system
10
. Stocker portion
20
includes stocker server
22
, as well as a plurality of stocker personal computers (PCs)
24
. Stocker PC's
24
are coupled to stockers
26
which provide storage bays for the semiconductor lot boxes and transportation between the storage bays.
Another gate
12
is coupled to analysis portion
30
of semiconductor processing system
10
. Analysis portion
30
includes equipment status server
34
which stores and reports on the equipment status and history and trend and engineering analysis (TEA) server
36
which collects and reports on process measurement data.
Another gate
12
is coupled to work station portion
40
. Work station portion
40
includes a plurality of work stations
42
which are used to provide visual information to users regarding the condition of manufacturing system
10
.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It has been discovered that by providing a manufacturing system with first and second control devices as well as a communication terminal which controls communication with the control devices, the manufacturing system advantageously includes fault tolerant functionality.


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