James S Balentine23860 Iron Horse, San Antonio, TX 78255

2012002, Feb 2, 2012

Sep 29, 2009

13/120634

Bryan Michael Jones - Cedar Park TX, US
Keith R. Bellville - Round Rock TX, US
James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US
Cindy Alsup Scott - Georgetown TX, US
Hubbard F. Fellows - Round Rock TX, US

G05B 19/418

700 17

A process control management method in a computer system for configuring and supervising a process plant includes providing an interactive user interface to manage a plurality of objects in the process plant, where each of the plurality of objects corresponds to a physical or logical entity in the process plant, including generating a navigation pane to display a set of selectable items, each in the set of selectable items corresponding to a respective one of the plurality of objects, and generating a command pane to display a set of selectable controls, each in the set of selectable controls corresponding to a task to be performed on at least one of the plurality of objects in the process plant; receiving a selection of one of an item in the set of selectable items via the navigation panel and a control in the set of selectable controls via the command panel; determining an operational context based on the received selection, wherein the operational context corresponds to one of a range of actions applicable to the selection if the selection is an item selection, or a range of items to which the selection is applicable if the selection is a control selection; and adjusting one of the navigation pane or the command pane according to the operational context, including displaying a subset of selectable items in the navigational pane, wherein each in the subset of selectable items is within the range applicable to the selection, if the selection is a control selection, and displaying a subset of selectable controls in the command pane, wherein each in the subset of selectable controls is within the range applicable to the selection, if the selection is an item selection.

2012004, Feb 16, 2012

Sep 29, 2009

13/120632

Bryan Michael Jones - Cedar Park TX, US
Keith R. Bellville - Round Rock TX, US
James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US
Trevor D. Schleiss - Austin TX, US
Hubbard F. Fellows - Round Rock TX, US

Fisher-Rosemount Systems, Inc. - Austin TX

G05B 19/02

700 17

A process control configuration method in a user interface of a computer system for developing control strategies of a process plant, where the user interface defines a screen area to display a plurality of independent panes therein, includes generating a first edit pane, including displaying a graphical representation of a first set of logical or physical entities for carrying out respective process control operations in the process plant; generating a second edit pane, including displaying a graphical representation of a second set of logical or physical entities for carrying out respective process control operations in the process plant, wherein each in the first set and the second set of logical or physical entities includes at least one input and at least one output, and wherein each of the first edit pane and the second edit pane defines an independent user interface screen within the screen area; receiving a first selection of an output of a first entity in the first set of logical or physical entities; receiving a second selection of an input to a second entity in the first second of logical or physical entities; and automatically generating respective visual indicators in each of the first edit pane and the second edit pane in response to receiving the first selection and the second selection, wherein the visual indicators depict respective endpoints of a connection between the first entity and the second entity.

2012029, Nov 22, 2012

May 19, 2011

13/111560

James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US
Andre A. Dicaire - Round Rock TX, US
Cindy A. Scott - Georgetown TX, US
Donald Robert Lattimer - Chaska MN, US
Kenneth Schibler - Chesterfield MO, US
John R. Shepard - Austin TX, US
Larry O. Jundt - Round Rock TX, US

FISHER-ROSEMOUNT SYSTEMS, INC. - Austin TX

G05B 15/02

700 19, 700 79

A process control system coordinates with an associated asset management system to implement a plant safety mechanism and, in particular, to prevent unintended changes to, or otherwise undesired operation of, one or more process control equipment resources in a process plant. A maintenance technician uses the asset management system to request access to one or more of the process control equipment resources. A process operator receives the request via the process control system and grants or denies the request. Process control equipment resources for which a process operator grants a request are inoperable, in part or in whole, by the process control system. Upon completion of the maintenance task, the maintenance technician requests to return control of the process control equipment resource to the process operator. The return is complete when the process operator acknowledges the return of the resource to the process control system.

2010021, Aug 19, 2010

Feb 19, 2009

12/389026

James Randall Balentine - Austin TX, US
Gary Keith Law - Georgetown TX, US
Mark Nixon - Round Rock TX, US

G05B 19/00

700 87, 700 86

Example methods and apparatus to configure a process control system using an electronic description language (EDL) script are disclosed. A disclosed example method comprises loading a first script representative of a process plant, the first script comprising an interpretive system-level script structured in accordance with an electronic description language, and compiling the first script to form a second script, the second script structured in accordance with a vendor-specific configuration language associated with a particular process control system for the process plant.

2020030, Sep 24, 2020

Jun 2, 2020

16/890182

Larry Oscar Jundt - Round Rock TX, US
Gary Law - Georgetown TX, US
Edward McDevitt - Olathe KS, US
Matt Stoner - Blue Springs MO, US
Godfrey R. Sherriff - Austin TX, US
David R. Denison - Austin TX, US
Mark J. Nixon - Round Rock TX, US
James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US
J. Michael Lucas - Leicester, GB
Stephen Gilbert - Austin TX, US

G05B 19/042
H04L 12/46
H04L 12/00
G05B 19/418
G05B 15/02

Process control systems for operating process plants are disclosed herein. The process control systems include control modules that are decoupled from the I/O architecture of the process plants using signal objects or generic shadow blocks. This decoupling is effected by using the signal objects or generic shadow blocks to manage at least part of the communication between the control modules and the field devices. Signal objects may convert between protocols used by control modules and field devices, thus decoupling the control modules from the I/O architecture. Generic shadow blocks may be automatically configured to mimic the operation of field devices within a controller executing the control modules, thus partially decoupling the control modules from the I/O architecture by using the shadow blocks to manage communication between the control modules and the field devices.

2018001, Jan 18, 2018

Jul 15, 2016

15/211846

- Round Rock TX, US
Gary Law - Georgetown TX, US
Edward McDevitt - Olathe KS, US
Matt Stoner - Blue Springs MO, US
Godfrey R. Sherriff - Austin TX, US
David R. Denison - Austin TX, US
Mark J. Nixon - Round Rock TX, US
James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US
J. Michael Lucas - Leicester, GB
Stephen Gilbert - Austin TX, US

G05B 19/042
G05B 15/02

Process control systems for operating process plants are disclosed herein. The process control systems include control modules that are decoupled from the I/O architecture of the process plants using signal objects or generic shadow blocks. This decoupling is effected by using the signal objects or generic shadow blocks to manage at least part of the communication between the control modules and the field devices. Signal objects may convert between protocols used by control modules and field devices, thus decoupling the control modules from the I/O architecture. Generic shadow blocks may be automatically configured to mimic the operation of field devices within a controller executing the control modules, thus partially decoupling the control modules from the I/O architecture by using the shadow blocks to manage communication between the control modules and the field devices.

2015010, Apr 16, 2015

Dec 17, 2014

14/574025

- Round Rock TX, US
Cindy A. Scott - Georgetown TX, US
Molly Marie Firkins - Cedar Park TX, US
Bruce F. Grumstrup - Marshalltown IA, US
Dan H. Ussing - Georgetown TX, US
James R. Balentine - Austin TX, US

G05B 15/02

700 83

Methods and apparatus to provide a role-based user interface are disclosed herein. An example system disclosed includes a display device to depict a user interface. The example system also includes a processor. The example processor is to receive object information for an object in a process control system during a session, determine a user role based on the session, determine whether the object information is qualifying information based on the user role, and display the object information via the user interface when the object information is qualifying information.