Structuring production planning systems for computer applications

Activities in a job shop type mechanical company can be split in production, product cycle and production cycle. The corresponding flow in each of these are materials, manufacturing specifications and product requirements. Production planning will plan and control these flows. Basic data structures are a product model and a corresponding hierarchy linked to production resources. A planning system may be designed by combining a set of operation or building blocks. These are three types: user communication, data base management and basic operations. The basic operations cover all processing necessary in production planning and represent the fundamental building blocks. A list of basic operations is suggested.