Multi-granularity resource virtualization and sharing strategies in cloud manufacturing

Cloud Manufacturing is a new and promising manufacturing paradigm. Resource virtualization is critical for Cloud Manufacturing. It encapsulates physical resources into cloud services and determines the robustness of the cloud platform. This paper proposes novel multi-granularity resource virtualization and sharing strategies for bridging the gap between complex manufacturing tasks and underlying resources. The proposed approach considers three factors, including workflow, activity, and resource that significantly influence stepwise decompositions of a complex manufacturing task. Resource aggregation functions are constructed to classify resources over different granularities. Resource clustering algorithms are presented for mapping physical resources to virtualized resources. Cloud service specifications are designed to describe virtualized resources and are implemented through a prototype. A case study is illustrated to validate the proposed approach. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.