JPH0739144U - Image data communication system in semiconductor manufacturing equipment - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [Structure] When the screen displayed on the CRT 5 of the local controller 1 is displayed on the CRT 8 of the master controller 2, the screen information displayed in the specified format on the CRT 5 is transferred to the image data converter 10. Convert it to a format suitable for transmission on Ethernet 9,
It is transmitted via Ethernet 9. The transmitted image data is converted into the original format by the image data converter 10 on the master controller 2 side and given to the master controller 2. As a result, the CRT 8 of the master controller 2
A screen with the same contents as the CRT 5 is displayed on. [Effect] A screen having the same content as the screen displayed on the CRT 5 of the local controller 1 can be accurately and simultaneously displayed on the CRT 8 of another master controller 2,
The screen information can be managed more effectively.

Description

[Detailed description of the device]

[0001]

[Industrial applications]

 The present invention relates to an image data communication system in a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus that transmits image information between controllers provided for monitoring and controlling the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus.

[0002]

[Prior art]

 The semiconductor manufacturing equipment is provided with a controller for monitoring and controlling the operation of the semiconductor manufacturing equipment. For supervisory control using a controller, for example, there is a system including a master controller that performs centralized management and a lower-level local controller connected to the master controller. The controller is usually composed of computer equipment such as a personal computer, and has a display section for monitoring and control.

On the display unit, images in which measured values and the like are graphed and various charts are displayed. To display a graph on the display unit, software that displays a dedicated screen such as the horizontal axis or vertical axis of the graph and software that converts the measured value into a displayable form and displays it are used.

By the way, in the supervisory control of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus as described above, in order to perform the intensive supervisory control of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus, the image displayed on the display unit of the local controller can be displayed on the master controller. It is often done. In this case, conventionally, the numerical data calculated by the local controller and provided for display is transmitted to the master controller, and the master controller side displays the same screen as the screen displayed on the local controller based on the numerical data. Was being reproduced.

[0005]

[Problems to be solved by the device]

 However, in the above-mentioned conventional technique, in order to display the same screen as the local controller on the master controller side, the master controller side must also be equipped with the two kinds of software similar to the local controller. For this reason, when displaying different screens on both controllers, the master controller must also be equipped with screen-specific software, which increases the load on the master controller.

In addition, since numerical data is transmitted from the local controller to the master controller, the number of data that can be transmitted is limited when the number of data is considerably large as in a graph, and the average value A method of transmitting a part of the data was used, such as transmitting only the data. This made it difficult to reproduce the screen on the master controller side as well as the screen on the local controller side. On the other hand, if all the data is transmitted, it takes a long time to transmit the data. Moreover, since it takes time to transmit data, it was not possible to display real-time screen changes such as changes in measured values on the master controller side.

Further, when a problem occurs in which the screen is not displayed on the master controller side, it is difficult to determine the defective part because the software of both controllers or the transmission line may be abnormal. .

Further, when the functions of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus are modified or the specifications are changed in order to improve the performance, and the contents of the display screen need to be changed accordingly, the contents of the display screen are changed by the local controller. When it was changed, the contents of the display screen, that is, the software also had to be changed in the master controller accordingly.

As described above, in the conventional technique, not only is there a disadvantage that the data transmission efficiency is low because only the numerical data is transmitted, but it is also necessary to provide software according to the display contents, so that the system design / change is required. There was a drawback that the degree of freedom of was limited.

The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and an object thereof is to eliminate the above-mentioned inconvenience by transmitting data for each display screen.

[0011]

[Means for Solving the Problems]

 In order to solve the above problems, an image data communication system in a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus of the present invention connects a plurality of controllers each having a display section for monitoring control so as to perform monitoring control of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus and the controllers. The image information on the screen displayed on the display unit of the controller and the communication network such as Ethernet is converted into a form that can be transmitted by the communication network, and the image information transmitted by the communication network is displayed on the display unit. It is characterized by including a converter for converting into a displayable form.

[0012]

[Action]

 In the above configuration, for example, the screen displayed on the display unit of the controller corresponding to the local controller (herein referred to as the local controller) is displayed by the controller corresponding to the master controller (herein referred to as the master controller). When it is displayed on the display unit, first, the image information displayed on the display unit of the local controller is converted by the converter into a form that can be transmitted through the communication network. Then, this image information is transmitted to the master controller via the communication network.

On the master controller side, the transmitted image information is returned to its original form by the converter and provided to the master controller. As a result, the same screen as that displayed on the display unit of the local controller is displayed on the display unit of the master controller without complicated processing.

As described above, according to the above configuration, by transmitting the screen itself displayed on the display unit as image information between the controllers, the software for display processing for displaying the screen is displayed on the master controller side. All you have to do is to prepare. This eliminates the need for data processing to reproduce the screen and reduces the load on the controller.

Further, in the case where the screen is not displayed on the master controller side, if the screen is displayed on the local controller side, it can be specified that an abnormality has occurred in the transmission path.

Further, in the above configuration, since image information for each screen is transmitted, if a screen that changes from moment to moment is transmitted, the master controller displays the moving image displayed on the local controller. It becomes possible to do it. As a result, the screen that changes sequentially on the local controller side can be displayed in real time on the master controller side.

[0017]

【Example】

 An embodiment of the present invention will be described below with reference to FIGS. 1 to 3.

As shown in FIG. 1, this control system includes a local controller 1 and a master controller 2 as controllers. The local controller 1 and the master controller 2 are attached to a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus (for example, an ion implantation apparatus), and are distributed and arranged at predetermined locations.

The local controller 1 has a controller body 3, a keyboard 4, and a CRT 5 as a display unit. The local controller 1 is adapted to partially control and measure each device in the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus. A large-scale system has a plurality of such local controllers 1.

The master controller 2 has a controller body 6, a keyboard 7, and a CRT 8 as a display unit, and basically has the same configuration as the local controller 1. The master controller 2 is a controller placed above the local controller 1 and plays a role as a main controller of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus. It is also a man-machine controller and has a supervisory control function. .

The local controller 1 and the master controller 2 described above are configured by a dedicated computer or a general-purpose personal computer. Further, as described above, in order to perform communication between the controllers, they are mutually connected by a transmission line (not shown). Further, the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 are connected to each other by an Ethernet 9 as a communication network in order to exclusively transmit image information. In this Ethernet 9, data (image information) is transmitted using a TCP / IP protocol or the like. Image data converters 10 are provided as converters at the connection between the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 and the Ethernet 9.

The image data converter 10 can transfer the image information displayed on the CRT 5.8 from a format suitable for display on the CRT 5.8 (common to both controllers 1 and 2) via the Ethernet 9. While converting to, the opposite is done.

The data structure of the image data transmitted by the Ethernet 9 is as shown in FIG.

In the control system configured as described above, an operation when the screen displayed on the CRT 5 of the local controller 1 is displayed on the CRT 8 of the master controller 2 will be described.

In the local controller 1, the controller main body 3 causes the CRT 5 to display a screen such as a graph in a specified format. When the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 are connected to the Ethernet 9 to enable data transmission, the image information on this screen is converted by the image data converter 10 into a format suitable for transmission on the Ethernet 9. It becomes image data and is sent to the Ethernet 9.

When the image data is transmitted to the image data converter 10 on the master controller 2 side via the Ethernet 9, the image data converter 10 converts the image data into the original format. Then, in the master controller 2, the controller main body 6 displays the image information on the CRT 8.

Next, a communication procedure of image data between the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 will be described with reference to FIG.

First, the local controller 1 on the data transmitting side transmits a line connection request to the master controller 2 on the data receiving side. Upon receiving the connection request, the data receiving side connects and returns a connection completion response. The data transmission side starts data transfer upon receiving the connection completion response. On the other hand, the receiving side receives the data and performs display processing.

When the data transfer is completed, a connection disconnection request is transmitted from the data transmission side. Upon receiving the disconnection request, the data receiving side disconnects the connection and returns a connection disconnection completion response. Then, when the data transmitting side receives the response, the data transfer process ends.

As described above, in the control system according to the present embodiment, data is transferred between the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 using the Ethernet 9 to transfer information for each screen. Will be done. For this reason, even if a screen has an enormous amount of data such as a graph, it is not necessary to perform a troublesome process such as converting the numerical data into a graph by transmitting each screen.

Therefore, the controller main bodies 3 and 6 in the local controller 1 and the master controller 2 need only be provided with software for performing screen display processing regarding screen transmission. Therefore, when the screen display is performed, the controller bodies 3 and 6 do not need to perform conversion processing of numerical data and only perform the screen display processing, and the processing load is reduced.

Also, moving images can be transmitted by sequentially transmitting screens that change from moment to moment. As a result, a continuously changing screen on the local controller 1 side can be displayed on the master controller side 2 in real time following the change.

In this embodiment, the case where image data is transmitted from the local controller 1 side to the master controller 2 side has been described, but in the above configuration, the image is similarly transmitted from the master controller 2 side to the local controller 1 side. Data can be transmitted.

Further, in the present embodiment, the configuration having only one local controller 1 has been described, but a configuration having a plurality of similar local controllers 1 may be used. With such a configuration, it is possible to simultaneously display the screen displayed by a certain local controller 1 on another local controller 1 and the master controller 2, and the screen displayed on the master controller 2 It is also possible to display all the local controllers 1 simultaneously.

[0035]

[Effect of device]

 As described above, the image data communication system in the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus of the present invention is a communication network for connecting between a plurality of controllers each having a monitor control display unit for controlling the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus and the controllers. And converting the image information of the screen displayed on the display unit of the controller into a form that can be transmitted by the communication network, and converting the image information transmitted by the communication network into a form that can be displayed by the display unit. And a converter that

As a result, the screen itself displayed on the display unit is transmitted as image information between the controllers. Therefore, on the controller side that displays the transmitted image information, a normal screen is displayed in order to display the same screen as other controllers. Only the software for display processing needs to be provided, and it is not necessary to provide the dedicated software for numerical data processing required for each screen. Therefore, it is not necessary to perform numerical data processing for reproducing the screen, the burden on the controller can be reduced, and the time required for data transmission can be shortened.

Therefore, even when the contents of the display screen are changed due to the specification change of the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus, it is possible to deal with the change without changing the software. Also, when transmitting a screen displayed on a controller to another controller for display, if the screen is not displayed on the other controller, the image must be displayed on the controller of the transmission source. , It can be considered that there is an abnormality in the transmission path, and it becomes easier to identify the faulty part.

Further, in the above configuration, since the image information for each screen is transmitted, if a screen that changes from moment to moment is transmitted, the image displayed on one controller can be transmitted to another controller. It also becomes possible to display. As a result, the screen that changes sequentially on the local controller side can be displayed on the master controller side in real time.

Therefore, if the present invention is adopted, the screen having the same content as the screen displayed on the display unit of one controller can be accurately and simultaneously displayed on the other controller, and the management of the screen information is more effective. There is an effect that can be carried out.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing a schematic configuration of a control system according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing a data structure that can be transmitted by Ethernet provided between the control systems in FIG.

3 is a sequence diagram showing a communication procedure of image data in the control system of FIG.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 Local Controller (Controller) 2 Master Controller (Controller) 5 CRT (Display) 8 CRT (Display) 9 Ethernet (Communication Network) 10 Image Data Converter (Converter)

─────────────────────────────────────────────────── ─── Continuation of the front page (51) Int.Cl. ⁶ Identification number Office reference number FI technical display location H04L 12/40 7341-5K H04L 11/00 320

Claims (1)

[Scope of utility model registration request] 1. A plurality of controllers having a monitor control display unit for controlling the semiconductor manufacturing equipment, a communication network connecting the controllers, and a screen image displayed on the controller display unit. A semiconductor manufacturing device, comprising: a converter that converts information into a form that can be transmitted by the communication network, and a converter that converts image information transmitted by the communication network into a form that can be displayed by the display unit. Image data communication system in device.