nternational journal of computer integrated manufacturing , tập 23, số 8+9, 2010

International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Vol 23, Nos 8–9, August–September 2010, 687–690 EDITORIAL Semiotics-based Manufacturing System Integration The primary intention of this special issue (SI) is to promote semiotics as a candidate framework for a new Manufacturing System Integration (MSI) paradigm Considering semiotics as an emergent discipline in engineering, there is a question: are there, and (supposing there are) what are the implications of semiotics for the MSI? In other words, could semiotics be a new theoretical, or meta-theoretical, base for the conceptual, theoretical or practical shift in MSI discipline? Or, to be inclusive (or conservative): could semiotics represent an extension of the solution space in conceptual, theoretical, and/or practical terms, for the MSI discipline? The need for the new MSI paradigm is more and more obvious for several reasons: (1) There are problems for which the ‘traditional’ approaches, which are based on the semantic field, have no capacity to resolve, referring the problems that lead to the extremely high percentage of ‘failed’ and ‘challenged’ projects, such as the problems of acceptance of the engineering solutions by the clients despite technical correctness of the solutions, not managing incomplete specifications because of not understanding fully the clients’ needs, and similar, i.e not managing the problems in which the root is, in fact, not the technical correctness and/or information transaction but the technical solutions and information use, interpretation and communication (2) The growing complexity of the MSI issues, manifested through the growing frequency of emergence of new MSI tools of different kinds, and, consequently the requirements for their faster development and integration with the existing tools – in other words, the growing dynamics of the MSI issues Put simply, the primary intention of this SI on ‘Semiotics-based Manufacturing System Integration’ could be understood as ‘opening’ the question on a new paradigm of MSI The secondary intention, or more ‘conservatively’ the secondary objective, of this SI is more ‘traditional’: to present some research results on the use of semiotics ISSN 0951-192X print/ISSN 1362-3052 online Ó 2010 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/0951192X.2010.513809 http://www.informaworld.com for MSI In this respect, this SI comprises 11 papers that present some solutions, results, analyses and approaches that use the semiotics instruments for the improvement of various aspects of MSI These will be presented in more detail later The major question is, what exactly is semiotics? Semiotics could be seen as a meta-theoretical framework for new research and development of the MSI discipline In its most simple definition, semiotics is the science of ‘signs’ The signs could be linguistic or non-linguistic.1 The following two great scientists and thinkers are considered as the ‘fathers’ of semiotics: Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), American logician and founder of pragmatism, and Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), Swiss linguist, the ‘father’ of modern linguistics and structuralism, who laid down independently the basis of semiotics as a science on the transition of the nineteenth to twentieth century The domain of semiotics comprises three fields: syntax, semantics and pragmatics While syntax and semantics are well known in the MSI science, pragmatics is almost totally unknown as a discipline In a review of the publications in the field of MSI, it was not possible to find any contribution that addresses the pragmatics issues, except for very singular references in a wider context of MSI and without any further elaboration, or presentation, of research results and/or models However, in the areas of enterprise integration/‘interoperability’ (EI) (not necessarily addressing MSI) and information systems (IS) the situation is relatively different Considering the extent to which semiotics is used as an instrument in and a meta-model of the science of engineering, the greatest, implying a relevant, extent semiotics achieved was in the area of IS, while in the area of EI the extent of achievement could be said very low, if relevant at all, and in the area of MSI it is practically inexistent The promotion of semiotics in this SI has a significant success, originating today already a larger community and a greater number of research works and publications Semiotics could be seen as having a double relation to the science2 of MSI: it is both an instrument of MSI and a meta-model of the science of MSI Semiotics as the instrument of MSI means that the MSI as a discipline uses the models, mechanisms and procedures 688 Editorial of semiotics as an independent science for the objective of improvement of the MSI mechanisms, tools and processes Semiotics as the meta-model, or a metatheory, of the science of MSI means that semiotics of the actual ‘traditional’ science, or discipline, of MSI is being investigated From this perspective, semiotics is used as an explanatory and unification framework, or as an ‘organon’, of the sciences in general (Morris 1938), ‘since every science makes use of and expresses its results in terms of signs’, and might be used (as it is still not ) as an explanatory and unification framework, or as an ‘organon’, of the science of MSI In this SI, the relation of the MSI to semiotics is primarily instrumental, meaning that semiotics is used as a new instrument for improving MSI science and discipline This is valid for nine papers while two papers have used semiotics as a perspective for analysing two advanced scenarios of emergent MSI domains Of course, the ‘second’ relation between the MSI and the semiotics, i.e the semiotics of the MSI (whether ‘traditional’ or ‘semiotic’), is expected to be one of the subjects, or even an exclusive subject, of some future SIs Now, let me discuss about the papers that are integrated in this SI With regard to the semiotics applications in MSI, the papers can be summarised as follows: Criteria Semiotics’ relation to the MSI Semiotic field Type of signs No of papers Paper(s) Instrumental 1–9 Meta-theoretical Pragmatics – individual, community Pragmatics – society Linguistic Non-linguistic 10–11 1–8 (þ2) 10 (þ1) 9–11 (þ4, 6) 1–7, 9–11 (þ10) Value The papers in which the semiotics-based instruments are referred to and/or employed are as follows: Instrument Dialogue Negotiation Pragmatic web Grammar for processing semantic/ pragmatic information Virtual world Non-linguistic instruments: continuous improvement areas Social network Institutions Organisational architecture: Open Design Delphi methodology Paper(s) 1, 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 4, 10 11 The first paper represents an introductory paper by G.D Putnik and Z Putnik, on the semiotics-based MSI concept The paper presents the findings of an exploratory research on the potential of semiotics for MSI The findings strongly suggest that semiotics might be the base for a new paradigm of MSI In the first part, the paper introduces the basic notions of semiotics relevant for the MSI The second part presents a framework for the semiotics-based MSI and a model of the semiotics-based MSI, called ‘Generative Integration’ In the third part, some experimental set-ups, i.e prototype demonstrators of the Manufacturing Systems, are presented, as a platform for future research and development of the semiotics-based MSI The second paper by F.v Eijnatten and G.D Putnik presents the technique of dialogue as an integration mechanism The paper is expected to be of interest for the readership as it clarifies the differences between the dialogue techniques and the discussion, or argumentation, techniques which are usually confused, leading to inconsistent use of the terms ‘dialogue’ and ‘discussion’ (or ‘argumentation’) and consequently to inconsistent applications of these techniques In terms of dialogue use in MSI, it is used as a generative integration instrument for the creation of a manufacturing system as a learning organisation and in those organisations looking for the organisational renewal The third paper by N Jing and S Lu presents collaborative negotiation as another generative integration instrument Concerning semiotics, the negotiation processes belong to pragmatics, representing a ‘coconstruction process’ which is, in fact, a form of integration On the object-level, the authors present a new framework for improvement of the negotiation processes An additionally interesting aspect for the readers, concerning the second paper, is the opportunity to compare the negotiation processes based on argumentation with the dialogue technique (presented in the first paper) and to notice that the use of these two different techniques is justified in the totally different organisational contexts In the next paper, A Zelitchenko presents generative integration instruments on two levels On the lower level a ‘standard language with formal syntax and informal unlimited vocabulary for the pragmatic description of the projects’, i.e of the co-operative projects is presented On the higher level another new MSI instrument is presented: a new type of the social networks named ‘acting social network’, i.e the social networks that facilitate ‘common action’, contrary to the traditional social networks oriented to facilitation of social communication and exchange of information International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing The ‘acting social network’ aims to join potential partners in a new-generation of manufacturing systems (the virtual enterprises) The proposed mechanisms imply, actually, an upgrade of the well-known semantic web to the emerging pragmatic web – also virtually a new term for the MSI discipline The fifth paper by M Janssen and R Feenstra provides a generative integration instrument presenting a service portfolio, as one of the pragmatic web instruments The service portfolio used communication, synchronisation and generation of meaning among the stakeholders for the purpose of decision making on composition and reconfiguration of manufacturing chains, enabling rapid composition of manufacturing supply chain processes from reusable components This paper is the second paper that addresses the pragmatic web, through the specific instrument service portfolio, as an MSI semiotic-based instrument The paper by L.A Ripamonti and C.A Peraboni presents virtual worlds as one of the integration mechanisms Concretely, the multi-user virtual environments (MUVE) are presented and discussed This type of mechanism is especially oriented to the integration of (manufacturing) virtual enterprises in which the inherent dynamics of reconfigurations impose higher levels and qualitatively different barriers, such as personality, cultural, language, organisational and physical, for the effective and efficient integration MUVEs augment the actual lives of their users and support effectively the extension of people’s actual social networks, fostering social interaction and knowledge sharing, in fact supporting pragmatic and social levels of the semiotic framework The MUVEs also present a pragmatic web instrument and in this way, this paper refers to the pragmatic web too The seventh paper by B Provideˆncia and J Ciurana presents how human communication as a generative integration instrument could be integrated with a traditional CAD–Rapid Manufacturing system to create a powerful system for highly personalised product development In the Guest Editor’s opinion, the presented system might represent an initial model of how the traditional manufacturing system too (not only the new manufacturing system structures and tools, such as, e.g social networks, dialogue, negotiation, pragmatic web, etc.) might be enhanced by using ‘semiotic tools’ The next paper by J Andersson Schaeffer, J Cadavida & T Backstro¨m presents a non-linguistic generative integration instrument It is the ‘continuous improvement area’ Actually, the paper explores spatial design in continuous improvement areas and also explains how spatial design may hinder or support communication regarding improvements The semiotic 689 aspects of the spatial design for continuous improvement areas in industry implies a different perspective and includes aspects of cognition, information, communication and treats how and what the elements in the improvement areas communicate The improvement areas serve as a complement to the integration of manufacturing through computers Although non-linguistic, the continuous improvement area is considered as a pragmatic-based instrument In the paper by F Romero, a generative integration instrument on a social level is described This introduces the term ‘institution’, where an ‘institution’ is a socially devised construct Examples of institutions may include, among others, organisations with educational purposes (schools, universities), economic purposes (firms, trade unions, cooperatives), regulatory purposes (certification organisations, supervising agencies) or political purposes (political parties, government agencies) The paper elaborates the hypothesis on the institutions as the integration instruments through secondary analysis of the literature, and from primary and secondary analyses of case studies, and shows that social factors condition in important ways the shapes and even the possibility of the implementation and integration of manufacturing systems The tenth paper by P.J.G Garrido has used semiotics for analysing the organisational architecture as a generative integration mechanism Concretely, the organisation of Open Design that originates from the Free Software and Open Source Software organisations is analysed The generative nature of the Open Design organisational architecture, and the semiotics-based integration instruments, relays in the organisation’s openness From the other side, the organisation’s openness implies a kind of an underlying communication and action social network In the Guest Editor’s opinion, the Open (Design, Manufacturing, etc.) organisational architectures might represent the emergent new generation, and a new paradigm, for manufacturing systems and enterprises Obviously, these models are intrinsically dependent on the semiotics-based integration paradigm In the eleventh and final paper in the issue by R Jardim-Goncalves, A Grilo, T Hassan & A SteigerGarc¸a˜o, an analysis is introduced which is based on the organisational semiotics perspective of The European Commission’s social-technical study envisioning the single integrated information space, i.e the Single Electronic Market The study was grounded at a technological level on the ATHENA framework for systems interoperability, complemented with nonTechnological Interoperability Metrics (nT-IM) The paper analyses the vision of stakeholders and discusses the correlation of the technical framework and nontechnical interoperability measurement indicators with 690 Editorial semiotic levels and theories for MSI, identifying the principal challenges for MSI when characterised by the semiotic levels according to the stakeholders’ recognised issues At the end, it is expected that this SI improves this ‘state-of-the-art’, at least to ‘open’ the research that would result in definitive adoption or refutation of semiotics as an instrument of MSI and/or a metamodel of the science of MSI There is also a hope that this SI on semiotics will deserve the MSI research community’s attention adequate to the great potential of semiotics for the MSI, and for engineering in general Acknowledgments First, our acknowledgments and greatest thanks go to Prof Stephen Newman, Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing (IJCIM), and Dr Aydin Nassehi, Managing Editor, for their highest support and professionalism and, more importantly, their highest collaboration, understanding and patience during the development of this SI We would like to underline Prof Newman’s vision and openness to such an innovative project as this issue intends to be (the readers will judge) Next, our acknowledgments go to the authors, for their contributions and collaboration and especially to the authors who also served as reviewers, and other reviewers, for their great effort during the review process and for the suggestions they provided to the authors, without which this complex and challenging project would not have been made possible Notes For some semioticians, semiotics is a study of nonlinguistic signs only The study of linguistic signs belongs to linguistics as a separate discipline Paraphrasing Morris (1938) for the purpose of MSI Reference Morris, C 1938 Foundations of the theory of signs In: O Neurath, R Carnap, and C Morris, eds International encyclopedia of unified science, Vol 1, no Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1–2 (reprint in: Morris, C 1971 Writings on the general theory of signs, Hague, The Netherlands: Mouton, 17) Goran D Putnik Department of Production and Systems Engineering, Campus of Azurem University of Minho Guimara˜es, Portugal Email: putnikgd@dps.uminho.pt International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Vol 23, Nos 8–9, August–September 2010, 691–709 A semiotic framework for manufacturing systems integration – Part I: Generative integration model Goran D Putnika,b* and Zlata Putnikb a Department of Production and Systems Engineering, University of Minho, Portugal; bInterdisciplinary Centre for Production Technologies and Energy, University of Minho, Portugal (Received May 2010; final version received 20 July 2010) This paper presents the findings of exploratory research on the potential of semiotics for manufacturing systems integration (MSI) The findings strongly suggest that semiotics might be the basis for a new paradigm for MSI In the first part of the paper a number of needs for the new semiotic-based integration paradigm are presented The second part of the paper introduces the basic notions of semiotics and provides a discussion on the use of semiotics in MSI The third part presents a framework for the semiotics-based MSI, together with a model of the semioticsbased MSI, entitled ‘generative integration’ (GI) In the final part, some experimental set-ups, i.e prototype demonstrators of the manufacturing systems, elements and systems, are presented as a platform for future research and development of the semiotics-based MSI Keywords: manufacturing system; CIM; integration; interoperability; generative integration; semiotics; pragmatics; semantics Introduction The relevance of the semiotic approach in a social context in engineering has emerged in response to the failure of the traditional ‘technocentric’ approach to today’s information systems (IS) and organisations’ requirements as well as to the ‘software development crisis.’ (Note: semiotics has been introduced in different engineering fields at various times and to different levels of extent Considering the extent to which semiotics is used as an instrument and a metamodel of science of engineering, the greatest, implying the most relevant, extent was achieved in the area of information systems (IS), while in the area of EI the extent of achievement could be said to be relatively very low, if relevant at all, and in the area of MSI it is practically nonexistent However, because of the need for brevity in this paper an extensive presentation of the state-of-the art in the use of semiotics in engineering will be presented in a subsequent publication.) The software development crisis is manifested by a very high percentage of failed and/or ‘challenged’ projects, the percentage that goes up to 70% of all projects (the percentages are in fact different in different sectors.) (The Standish Group Int 2005) These percentages are also referred to as ‘shameful numbers’ (Note: The Standish Group categorises projects into three resolution types: (a) Successful: the project is completed on time and on budget, with all the features and functions *Corresponding author Email: putnikgd@dps.uminho.pt ISSN 0951-192X print/ISSN 1362-3052 online Ó 2010 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/0951192X.2010.510292 http://www.informaworld.com originally specified (b) Challenged: the project is completed and operational, but over-budget, over the time estimate, and with fewer features and functions than initially specified (c) Failed: the project is cancelled before completion or never implemented.) While it can be safely claimed that the use of advanced computer technologies is contributing to further improvements of (integration) system’s efficiency (e.g reduction of the throughput time), the contribution of the ‘technology-oriented’ approach to the projects failure rate (in the above terms) is less obvious, if not detrimental Actually, according to the Standish Group Int.’s report the top five factors for project success are not technological (in fact, the formal methodologies, and standard tools and infrastructures – that could be considered as technological means – are ranked 9th and 10th in the list of 10) In other words, ‘Tools by themselves not promote success; the proper use of the tools does.’ According to R Stamper [‘A Dissenting Position’ in FRISCO Report (Falkenberg et al 1998)], the traditional approach fails ‘not for technical reasons – most delivered software performs efficiently to specification – but for organisational reasons – they not relate correctly to the world of business reality The sad fact is that in general, technical people not understand business problems and business-oriented people not understand the need for detailed, formal 692 G.D Putnik and Z Putnik precision, which contributes to the problem.’ In the FRISCO Report, it is identified that ‘there are at least three major sources of problems: (a) the large variety of interest groups, (b) conflicting philosophical positions, and (c) the lack of understanding communication.’ Also, it was realised that ‘the social, cultural and organisational aspects play more decisive roles than technology itself’ (Liu 2000) According to Moor and Weigand (2002), information systems should be approached ‘much more as communication systems than computation systems’ To deal with the communication systems, the ‘move away from the traditional information flow paradigm, in which positivistic modelling of symbol manipulating functions aimed is needed (Stamper 2000) The information systems built on the information field paradigm not produce sterile data, but aim to generate and communicate information that can lead to knowledge that helps people to perceive, understand, value, and act in the world’ (Moor and Weigand 2002) A good illustration of what it means is given in Tables and When considering manufacturing systems integration (MSI), it is obvious that the MSI problem is just a particular case of the information systems Therefore, it could be claimed that there is a major integration/ interoperability problem relating to MSI, e.g Newman et al (2008) Actually, the transaction-based integration is, in many cases, effective only within limited, Table From information to communication systems (Moor and Weigand 2002) Focus: Supports: Design objects: Development process: Developers Information systems Communication systems Information Transaction processes Clear specifications Communication Communication processes ‘Fuzzy’ process definitions Continuous process Single project Elite development team Many stakeholders Table From information flow to information field (Moor and Weigand 2002) Information flow Change: Responsibility: Static Anonymous Design process: Objective: Representation Control Control logic: Rules IS information field Dynamic Individual responsibilities Interpretation Perceive, understand, value, act Norms well-organised domains and on the lower levels of communication Even for the traditional enterprise domains, e.g intra-enterprise domains such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), the traditional approaches failed to provide effective and efficient solutions Example For example, theoretically, the opensystem integration architecture (based on a standards, i.e based on a ‘neutral-format’ data file) is considered more flexible and more efficient than federated integration architecture However, the practice refutes this idea In practice, an integration-federated architecture that uses 250 prebuilt adaptors ‘is capable of immediately connecting to virtually any information system, rapidly integrating more data sources on more platforms and across more network protocols than any other integration solution’ (InterSystems 2004) Development of those 250 adaptors is probably less time and energy-consuming than the development of standards for the same application domain (for problems on standards and ontologies development, see, e.g Libes et al (2004) and Nell (1998)) Example Another example is from the area of CAD, where supposedly the product geometrical data neutral format standards are well defined However, it happens that original equipment manufacturing (OEM) companies require, or more correctly, force their cooperation on partners to have exactly the same CAD software as the OEM companies This requires the OEM supply companies to solely have totally identical processors and post-processors for the same standards used by the OEM company The true meaning of this is that the data standards are phenomenologically irrelevant because an OEM could choose some totally proprietary CAD software and force the partners to use it For each OEM’s partner it means that it is required to have as many different CAD softwares for each OEM it cooperates This really portrays the reality of how reliable commercial tools are considered for integration based on standard data formats Ironically, the researchers and funding bodies believe the integration problem to be solved, with researchers now investigating areas such as optimisation of the CAD processes management From the semiotics perspective, the above examples are explained considering the semiotic fields, their ordering and abstraction degrees The above examples mean that although the standards might be well defined logically, formally and socially – in terms of the social agreement on definitions, the practice is somehow different and the real solutions pass on the side of the socially agreed standard definitions While the standards could be considered the solutions on the syntactic and semantic levels, the integration solutions from the above examples could be considered as International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing solutions on the pure pragmatic level From the semiotics point of view the differences between the semantics and pragmatics-based solutions, in relation to reality, are due to different degrees of abstractions of semantics and pragmatics, which confirms the need of consideration of pragmatics, i.e semiotics in integration problems resolution Further, when integration is considered in a complex, dynamic, nonlinear, ‘chaotic’ environment, the problems might be even more difficult Actually, in a complex, dynamic, nonlinear, ‘chaotic’, ‘uncertain’ environment, MSI implies 1) dynamic establishment and management of the interactions, and 2) novel, emergent, instantaneous as well as ‘ad-hoc’ (‘synchronic’) integration solutions, among manufacturing systems tools, agents and stakeholders, intra- and especially inter-organisations (intra- and inter-enterprises) It is not realistic to expect that each tool, agent and stakeholder within the organisation and each perspective partner in an inter-organisation relationship, is in possession of ‘perfect’ standard-based solutions, the state-of-the-art technology, and even the ‘ideal’ knowledge It means that in such imperfect situations, which are part of the real world, the partners must have the ability to create or to synthesise efficiently an effective integration solution Moreover, the partners must have the ability to implement integration process management, as MSI is a complex process and not only a data transactional process For that reason, the authors have coined the term ‘generative integration’ The first formulation of the generative integration appeared in Putnik et al (2005) This paper presents an improved formulation The rest of the paper presents, as the second part, an introduction to basic notions of semiotics The third part discusses the generative integration as a model of semiotics-based MSI and the fourth part is where some 693 experimental set-ups, i.e prototype demonstrators of the manufacturing systems, elements and systems, are presented, as a platform for the future research and development of semiotics-based MSI Concerning the scientific method, the paper presents an exploratory research based on the secondary data analysis Semiotics – an introduction to basic notions In its most condensed form, the definition of semiotics, or semiology, is the study of signs In modern use, semiotics, or semiology, was conceived as a general theory of signs at the turn of the 20th century in the works of two great scientists and thinkers: Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914), American logician and founder of pragmatism (Figure 1), and Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), Swiss linguist, the ‘father’ of modern linguistics and structuralism (Figure 2) Fascinatingly, both formulated semiotics, or semiology, respectively, independently and almost at the same time 2.1 ‘Sign’ The central concept of semiotics is the ‘sign’ Peirce gave a number of definitions of the ‘sign’, as well as comments on various aspects of the ‘sign’ from which we select the following: ‘I define a Sign as anything which is so determined by something else, called its Object, and so determines an effect upon a person, which effect I call its Interpretant, that the latter is thereby mediately determined by the former.’ (A Letter to Lady Welby, SS 80–81, 1908) ‘No sign can function as such except so far as it is interpreted in another sign’ (CP 8.225n10 1904.07 [Draft probably of a letter to Paul Carus]) Peirce’s definition of the ‘sign’ (S) is a ‘structure’ of three constituents, or a ‘triadic relation’: object (O), Figure Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) Figure Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913) 694 G.D Putnik and Z Putnik representamen (R), interpretant (I), or, in other words, the sign is a triple: S ¼ (O, R, I) These are usually graphically represented as in Figure 2.2 Sign process The ‘sign process’ means the process of creation of signs through effects produced by some other sign(s) This process is called ‘semiosis’ Peirce described semiosis as: ‘But by ‘semiosis’ I mean, on the contrary, an action, or influence, which is, or involves, a cooperation of three subjects, such as a sign, its object, and its interpretant’, CP 5.484, 1907 (Robin 318, Pragmatism) As the sign may produce another triadic relation, i.e the sign may be interpreted in another sign, we have a sequence of interpretations Consequently, ‘the process of referring effected by the sign is infinite.’, Jean-Jacques Nattiez (1990: 7) (cited in http://psychology.wikia.com/wiki/Signifier), e.g Figure 2.3 Field of observation and/or ‘information field’ Change of the sign along time Saussure has called diachrony, or diachronic dimension/perspective of sign, while its state, and relations with other signs, without any consideration of time, i.e without any consideration of diachronic perspective, is called synchrony, or synchronic dimension/perspective of sign Concerning these two dimensions of the sign we have a phenomenon of the major importance for our thesis on semiotic-based MSI (and of IS in general) This phenomenon is the ‘field’ of observation The ‘field’ of observation emerges from the fact that the user is unaware of diachronic dimension and considers only the synchronic dimension They enter our field of observation only when they have become accepted by the community.’ (Saussure 1916, p.97) [bold formats by GP, ZP] Implication of the ‘field of observation’ is that actually it is hardly possible to exist an ‘absolute’, common and universal, interpretation of reality, but, rather, there are multiple interpretations by multiple communities and in different times This phenomenon is similarly referred in information systems (IS) by Stamper (1999) (referred independently), as the information field The information field is defined by overlapping groups of people that share norms (Stamper 2009), or information field(s) is(are) field(s) of norms shared by organisational agents and govern their behaviour (Filipe 2004), or information field(s) is(are) field(s) of ‘subcultures with shared norms’ (Stamper 1999) (Note: Norms exist in a community and will govern how members behave, think, make judgements and perceive the world The shared norms are what define a culture or subculture A subculture may be a team who know how to work effectively together, and their norms include a solution to their organisational problems Norms are, actually, a special kind of signs A norm is more like a field of force that makes the members of the community tend to behave or think in a certain way.’ (Stamper et al 2000) Also, a norm is ‘the unifying concept across all the layers of the organisational structure’ (Filipe 2004)) Information field forms one of the basic concepts within the semiotic framework for IS (see Section 1) Obviously, the ‘group of people that ‘ Speech contains the seeds of every change, each one being pioneered in the first instance by a certain number of individuals before entering into general usage This form, constantly repeated and accepted by the community, became part of the language Figure structure Representation of the Peirce’s sign elementary Figure Peirce’s sign: representation of the sequence of sign interpretations in other signs International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing share norms’ are Saussure’s communities that share signs The concept could be graphically represented as in Figure 5: ‘Shared norms constitute what is called the ‘social reality’ – something not given at once for all, but constantly in the process of being redefined and renegotiated’ 2.4 Semiotic fields Three particular fields of semiotics study have been identified by Charles Morris (1946): syntactics, semantics and pragmatics These fields are called semiotic fields, (not to be confused with ‘field of observation’ or ‘information field’), which are the fields of dyadic relations among the three correlates of the triadic relation of semiosis Charles Morris (1946) defined them as follows: ‘pragmatics deals with the origin, uses and effects of signs within the behavior in which they occur; semantics deals with the signification of signs in all modes of signifying; syntactics deals with combination of signs without regard for their specific significations or their relation to the behaviour in which they occur.’ (Morris 1946:302) The universally accepted order among the three semiotic fields, introduced by Carnap (1942), is based on their degree of abstractness in relation to complete signs and semiosis: ‘If in an investigation explicit reference is made to the speaker, or, to put it in more general terms, to the user of language, then we assign it to the field of pragmatics If we abstract from the user of the language and analyse only the expressions and their designate, we are in the field of semantics And if, finally, we abstract from the designata also and analyse only the relations between the expressions, we are in (logical) syntax.’ (Carnap 1942: 9) (cited in Recanati (2004)) 695 This criterion could be considered of the maximum importance as it ‘reveals’ proximity to the reality of syntactics, semantics and pragmatics Generative integration (GI) Generative integration (GI) is characterised by the ability to create, synthesise or generate the integration solution – effectively in the first place and then efficiently The fundamental and qualitative new feature of generative integration is employment of semiotics as an instrument, especially employing pragmatics instruments Speaking about pragmatics, pragmatics is not another model or another representation of information, as sometimes misinterpreted and/or sometimes wrongly reduced to semantical representation Rather, pragmatics is an information meta-model which treats information as a nondeterministic process in which any attempt of ‘writing’, i.e to ‘fix’ or to formalise information in fact prevents the creative process of interpretation, i.e prevents codesign and/or co-creativity Thus, a pragmatic approach is live communication – speech, i.e ‘parole’ (Saussure) – in a synchronic, or paradigmatic, dimension of the communication language, and not language, i.e ‘langue’ (Saussure), as a formal, or formalised, or normed, structure, in its diachronic, or syntagmatic, dimension Therefore, for the semiotics-based MSI, and its generative integration model, pragmatics is a distinguishing feature The fundamental integration mechanism for the semiotics-based MSI, and its generative integration model, is a live human communication – speech (‘parole’), mainly by verbal signs, but also by nonverbal signs, with associated underlying cognitive processes Figure (a) Information fields, overlapping groups of people that share norms (Stamper 1999); (b) an example of communities sharing their own information fields (Stamper 2009) International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing been developed While the relative importance and relevance of each of these non-technological parameters would depend on the collaboration environment, all of the identified parameters play a role in evaluating overall non-Technological collaboration interoperability, characterised as a non-Technical Interoperability Measurement, i.e., nT-IM (Figure 2) These parameters cover the principal levels and characteristics of manufacturing systems integration, and are to be utilised to measure and quantify the overall interoperability between two organisations, so that an Interoperability Index can be computed as an Overall Interoperability Score (OIS) (Zutshi 2010) According to this method, each of the parameters assume different relevance in different interoperability contexts, like relevance of Employees and Work Culture is less important in purely transactional Figure 837 collaborations between a seller and a buyer than for collaborative research assignments Certainly, the ATHENA project results triggered a new worldview over the systems integration through its AIF, including on the manufacturing environment, e.g., automotive, aeronautics, building and construction, furniture However, it did not provide a sound methodology to develop much further the intangible dimension The nT-IP methodology is able to better characterise in a quantitative way the importance of the non-technical issues of integration, stressing the importance of the ‘soft’ dimension on the integration challenge Nevertheless, the ATHENA framework, even complemented with the nT-IP, still fails to provide a solid framework to address the development of MSI in a holistic perspective Supported by a comprehensive Non-Technological Interoperability Measurement framework (Adapted from Zutshi, 2010) 838 R Jardim-Goncalves et al study, especially focused on the manufacturing systems stakeholders view, the social and organisational semiotics suggest to have a relevant role contributing for a overall framework for MSI The single European electronic market and manufacturing systems integration The Single European Electronic Market (SEEM) is a contributor to the European Commission’s Single European Information Space (SEIS) vision towards an Internet-based structured space, where companies can access the huge amount of information already presented in vertical portals and corporate databases and use it for dynamic, value-adding collaboration purposes (Reding 2005, Jardim-Gomcalves 2010) One of the major beneficiaries of SEEM is MIS, although it will be completely integrated in the SEIS The Single European Electronic Market is intended to provide a seamless electronic space, where companies, irrespective of size or location, can work with no practical restraints SEEM implementation refers to the possibility, for European companies, to gain visibility in the global market, find partners, be supported in negotiation and collaboration activities, with special attentions to the specific needs and expectations of SMEs, and comprises three relevant themes (Bonfatti and Borras 2004): (1) Visibility, i.e the possibility, for every company, to be searched and found by possible customers or suppliers on the basis of its profile, offer and demand as published in SEEM eRegistries (2) Collaboration, i.e the possibility, for every company, to use SEEM-based eServices to contact, negotiate, contract and co-work with its partners wherever they are located (3) Organisation size, i.e the need to take into special account those SEEM aspects that are of special importance for the participation of smaller companies into the global electronic market SEEM addresses weaknesses in areas that are critical for European competitiveness, including the relationship between social-ICT, especially through the applicability of scientific advances to wide communities of companies, strengthening the position of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and especially the smallest companies, and stimulating the development of disadvantaged regions, with particular attention to New Member States and Associated Candidate Countries (NMAS) (Bonfatti and Monari 2003, 2005) Thus, it is expected that the SEEM will contribute to some major priorities on the European Commission agenda In particular, it will stimulate the take-up of Manufacturing Systems Integration (MSI) in Europe, increase the competitiveness of SMEs through the provision of advanced process models and tools, help them afford the competitive pressure of the electronic market, support the creation of new employment opportunities, and focus the research activity on some major topics of the Information Society In this challenging perspective, SEEM addresses a number of points that are critical: i) Modernising the organisation of work; ii) Promoting employment; iii) Qualifying jobs iv) Increasing social cohesion v) Assuring lifelong learning; and vi) Exploiting the Information Society opportunities (Linstone and Turoff 2002) SEEM is likely to have a major relevance for manufacturing systems integration challenge, especially if it is considered the network dimension rather than just the internal boundaries of companies However, as MSI is an important dimension on SEEM, it is important to understand what factors will condition its deployment in order to be a foreseeable reality To illustrate how SEEM can be used in manufacturing system integration, the following two cases have been studied (Jardim-Goncalves 2008): Case study SAXIAL, Engines, Valves and Gears are autonomous SMEs producing fluid-power and mechanical components, namely engines, valves and gearboxes Their size ranges from 40 to 150 employees and to 50 million Euros of yearly turnover They decide to constitute a peer-to-peer network to design, engineer and manufacture a compact motor wheel for crawlers, small diggers and snowmobiles, the motor wheel being constituted by an engine, a valve and a gearbox The reason to establish this collaboration is competing in a worldwide market that is presently led by big Japanese companies Two basic conditions are agreed upon: each SME remains autonomous and maintains its own customers, and the subdivision of work between AXIAL and ENGINES, the two engine producers, is based on a precise balance rule Case study EUROMACHINES (25 employees and 18 million Euros of yearly turnover) is a producer of finished machine tools (metal sheet bending, punching and cutting machines) for the worldwide market In addition to suppliers and subcontractors, it has two small companies as main partners: NUMERIC to provide the CNC component and MECHANIC to ensure the final assembly and test of products International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Although independent of each other, the three companies collaborate on the basis of a strong agreement assigning to each of them a precise role, including the commercial function and brand of EUROMACHINE The envisaged application of services that the SEEM could provide to support the two mentioned manufacturing networks would include: (1) Technical document exchange between the CAD systems adopted by the companies of the enterprise network, with automatic format translation, to realise an efficient co-design organisation (2) Business document exchange between legacy systems, both within the enterprise network and with the main customers and suppliers, with automatic contents and format translation, so as to enhance the information flow (3) Search for new suppliers and subcontractors, by accessing sectoral eRegistries in the regions of interest, to cover special needs or obtain better performances at lower costs (4) Distributed resource planning and scheduling, including productive activities as well as materials acquisition, quality control, warehousing, transports, packaging and delivery, to efficiently distribute the workload among the partners (5) Distributed workflow management, in order to keep under control the activities performed by the different partners, suppliers and subcontractors, identify possible deviations and exceptions and undertake the needed countermeasures Vision of stakeholders towards SEEM With the objective of analysing the development of SEEM and the factors that may facilitate its successful deployment, to get the vision of stakeholders towards SEEM a study was performed in a structured way supported by the Delphi methodology, in two sequential rounds (Linstone and Turoff 2002) It addressed anonymous participation, sharing of information, and reasoning with participants, leading to independent thinking and the gradual formulation of a final opinion A group of experts on SEEM issues was selected from a pool of stakeholders, and contributed to the study This group of experts comprises individuals with different profiles and experience in the principal areas of the study, including legal and regulatory frameworks, public administration, standards, technology, security, industry, and social and economic matters 839 The stakeholders were divided into the following groups: Public Administration & Policy Makers; Standardisation Bodies and Consortia; Manufacturing Industry; eService Providers; Consulting and Technology Vendors; Education and Training; and Research Owing to the number of interlocutors with different profiles, and the variety and complexity of the data to be collected, a specific software tool was developed to support the acquisition and compilation of information, and on-line exploitation of the study results Figure depicts the general structure of the questionnaire used The SEEM issues have been evaluated by the following SEEM indicators: (1) Level of Expertise: used to confirm if the respondent is confident with the SEEM issue, and how much accuracy can be attributed to the responses This is measured as high, medium, low, and none (2) Relevance for SEEM: used to validate if the issue is considered important for the SEEM Those issues not relevant for SEEM can be removed in the next rounds of the questionnaire This is measured as high, medium, low, and none (3) Impact: used to know where the SEEM issue will have more impact, in Public Administration, Citizenry, or Industry (4) Time to Happen: used to know when the respondent thinks the addressed issue will occur in time The time scale used is 2007, 2010, 2015, Never (5) Barriers: used to identify the major barriers when facing the SEEM issue; includes social, technological, regulatory, economic, and cultural (6) Relative Competitive Position: used to evaluate who is in the best position in the SEEM issue among Europe, USA, and Japan (7) EU Policy Actions for Improvement: used to obtain feedback from the respondent about the areas where the EU must improve the policy actions in the respective issue: research, Figure Questionnaire structure 840 R Jardim-Goncalves et al regulation, IT standards, infrastructure, economic, promotion/awareness, training and education Before the second round of the Delphi method, the conclusions of the first round were reported to the experts in a formal workshop to find a consensus on the state, the trends, and the recommendable actions to promote a smooth implantation of the SEEM The Delphi rounds of the study involved 1400 experts, representing different regions and stakeholder groups Participants were from a range of 70 countries, mostly from central and southern Europe, but also many respondents from non-European countries About 40% of the respondents were representatives Figure Distribution by region Figure Distribution by stakeholder of industry, consulting companies, technology vendors, e-Service providers, public administrators, and policy makers in SEEM-related areas Figures and show the distribution of participants, respectively, by region and stakeholder group Based on the information collected from experts’ survey and interviews, the results are organised into five groups, and presented in the next sub-sections, namely: a) General issues, b) Policies and regulations, c) SEEM technologies, d) SEEM services, and e) SEEM impact In particular, General issues introduces the discussion on possible supportive actions and business language adoption; Policies and regulations addresses International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing issues like e-procurement, e-contracts, common regulations, electronic IDs, EU domain regulation, and public authority coordination; SEEM technologies covers areas like collaboration, interoperability, standards, and communications; SEEM services highlights features such as trust-enhancement, independent certification, conflict resolution, trustable translations, and traceability; finally, SEEM impact focuses on openness, affordable solutions, accessibility, and delocalisation 4.1 Stakeholders vision on general issues The analysis of the SEEM general issues reflects that, although considered relevant, the support of EU authorities is not considered key for the development of the SEEM concept (Table 2) These findings can be based on either the doubt of the potential influence of the EU public administration in the future of the single European information space implementation, or the preference for self-regulation of the market Most respondents expected SEEM to start being implemented by 2010, even without relevant or specific support from EU authorities This means that the experts have elevated confidence in the possibilities and attraction power of the SEEM concept, but it does not exclude specific supporting actions to be developed not only by the EU authorities, but also at national and regional levels Indeed, the majority of respondents consider the Policy Actions to be concentrated in the promotion and implementation of IT standards in order to facilitate the SEEM concept implementation by 2010, but they immediately add ‘regulation’ actions as the second most important improvement area for the EU Authorities to concentrate on This reveals Table Stakeholders vision on SEEM general issues 841 interest in the role that the EU Authorities can play in the development of the SEEM concept ‘Research’ support actions and ‘awareness’ campaigns are the next ones on the list Reinforcing the statement above, the experts participating in the study consider the regulatory issue to be the most important barrier for the SEEM to be implemented without support of the Public Authorities Although the EU authorities would decide not to generate specific supporting actions, this suggests that at least regulations should be revised, improved, and adapted to the new requirements for the SEEM to be implemented in full Respondents consider Europe to be in a low competitiveness position compared to the USA and Japan in this issue Social heterogeneity, budget decentralisation, decision centres and other European-specific issues should lead Europe to concentrate more on the coordination of efforts and resources with national and regional levels whenever possible Having English as the lingua franca for most crossborder eBusiness seems to have a high probability when implementing the SEEM concept The impact of using English as the main language in all business transactions is foreseen mainly for SMEs and individual citizens The expected time to happen is identified as 2010 The adoption of English, even accepted worldwide as a universal language, in most European countries would be seen as a major social and cultural barrier Europe is relatively behind the USA, as would be expected, since English is the dominant language in that country, but ahead of Japan Training actions, European countries education systems revision, promotions, and awareness, are considered to be important EU policy actions to follow 842 R Jardim-Goncalves et al 4.2 Stakeholders vision on policies and regulations It is very important to the SEEM concept to have harmonised e-procurement processes and laws that will form the basis for market rules, business competitiveness, and consumer protection (Table 3) The impact will be on industry, both on SMEs and large companies The time horizon for this to happen is foreseen to 2010 Harmonised processes for e-procurement must overcome regulatory and cultural barriers European competitiveness is low when compared to other economies such as the USA and Japan To harmonise the eprocurement processes in Europe, a major effort is needed in EU in regulation and IT standards To achieve SEEM, it is important to have contracts created and negotiated automatically, based on predefined guidelines and common business processes across member states The principal impact of this measure will be on SMEs and large companies The expected time for this to happen is 2015 or beyond, due to major regulatory and cultural barriers Europe is relatively behind the USA and Japan in this issue The greatest hurdle for Europe is improving its policy actions Common regulations regarding digital rights management and intellectual property rights are of great importance to the implementation of the SEEM Table Stakeholders vision on SEEM policies and regulations concept The impact will be mainly on large companies and SMEs The regulatory barriers this issue must overcome will make it possible to happen only after 2010 Although Europe already has some regulations on this issue, putting Europe’s economy in the same position as Japan, Europe is still relatively behind the USA Regulation actions must be improved on digital management and intellectual property rights in order to promote trust Having electronic IDs and eSignatures harmonised within the EU is also of great importance to SEEM implementation The impact of such harmonisation will be on individual citizens and public administrations all over Europe This process might take until 2010 after resolving all regulatory and technological barriers Europe must invest in IT Standards and regulation actions to move toward and come closer to the economies of the USA and Japan 4.3 Stakeholders vision on SEEM technologies Fully interoperable federated registries supported by common ontologies to provide access to services offered by companies and individuals all over Europe are important technologies to be addressed in the implementation of the SEEM concept (Campbell 2004, Abels 2004), but they are not crucial (Table 4) The SME were identified as the main entities using such International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Table 843 Stakeholders vision on SEEM technologies registries It is expected that the use of ontologies on federated registries will come into full use by organisations between 2010 and 2015, after resolving technological and regulatory barriers Europe is relatively behind the USA and in the same position as Japan in this regard The need for EU policy actions to improve IT standards and research has also been cited (Abels et al 2004, Campbell and Hahn 2004) Advanced collaboration platforms are important in order to facilitate the dynamic formation of virtual organisations within the SEEM concept The impact is expected to be on SMEs and large companies Only technological and cultural barriers are expected to be fully addressed by advanced collaboration platforms by 2010 Although Europe is ahead of Japan in this issue, it is important to improve EU policy actions on research and IT standards, in order to increase competitiveness toward the American economy The ontology-based semantic web as a cornerstone for eBusiness, and a common reference framework for advertisement and discovery of web services are of medium importance to the implementation of the SEEM concept (Bogataj and Pucihar 2007) The impact will be on SMEs and large companies The creation and adoption of a semantic web might take some time to achieve, and the experts put the time line between 2010 and 2015 EU policy actions on research and IT standards might accelerate the process The existence of a set of standards and protocols for service brokerage and negotiation is of medium importance in the implementation of the SEEM concept The impact will be on SMEs and large companies The expected time to occur is between 2010 and 2015, with regulatory and technological barriers Europe is relatively behind the USA and ahead of Japan For this issue to happen, EU policy actions on IT standards, regulation, and research should be improved The expertise of respondents on this issue was between high and medium Standardised data interoperability frameworks are highly important to facilitate the collaboration across different vertical sectors when implementing the SEEM concept The impact is expected to be mainly on SMEs and large companies The technological, regulatory, and economic barriers will slow the process until 2015 Europe is in a good position in relation to Japan, but at a disadvantage when compared to the USA EU policy actions on IT standards, research, and regulation are expected to increase competitiveness Broadband communication and technologies available everywhere at anytime and at affordable costs in the EU are a prerequisite to the implementation of the SEEM concept Individual citizens and SMEs will benefit from this process Only economic and 844 R Jardim-Goncalves et al technological barriers were identified that are likely to slow the process to around 2010 Europe is relatively behind both the USA and Japan, and importance of EU policy actions on infrastructure and economic actions were identified Interoperable location-based services as providers of mobility in Europe are of medium importance to the implementation of the SEEM concept Adoption of interoperable location-based services will have a major impact on individual citizens and SMEs The implementation of such services is predicted to be complete in 2010, after technological and economic barriers are overcome Europe is relatively behind both the USA and Japan, so EU policy actions on infrastructure, IT standards, and economic actions are urged Peer-to-peer communication is not a key technology for eBusiness development and knowledge sharing on the SEEM, but the development of eBusiness using peer-to-peer communications would have major impact on SMEs and individual citizens Peer-to-peer technology was identified as being ready for eBusiness use by 2007, where technological and economic barriers must be faced Even in a good position, Europe is still relatively behind the USA and Japan in this issue EU policy actions on research and IT standards would help to close the gap The Open Source Community is not considered to be a major player to the implementation of the SEEM concept The impact is expected only on SMEs with major economic, technological, and regulatory barriers to be overcome by 2010 Although Europe is relatively behind the USA, it is ahead of the Japanese economy EU policy actions on research, IT standards, promotion, and awareness are recommended Table Stakeholders vision on SEEM services 4.4 Stakeholders vision on SEEM services Online trust-enhancement services across Europe are vital to provide up-to-date trust-related information about organisations and individuals willing to business in the SEEM (Table 5) SME and individual citizens would benefit from such services, but for that, regulatory, social, economic and technological barriers must be resolved by 2010 Europe is relatively behind the USA and ahead of Japan in this regard It was recognised that EU policy actions on regulation, promotion, and awareness should be improved Independent certification agencies are not crucial to verify and attest the conformance to SEEM related policies and regulations in order to ensure reliability and interoperability If there is any impact, it will be on SMEs Independent certification agencies are predicted to be in use only in 2015 or beyond, after solving regulatory and economic barriers Europe was identified to be behind the USA and ahead of Japan Regulation actions are the major ones that should be improved Common online conflict resolution services were not considered to be the best solution to solve SEEM participant’s disputes If implemented, the impact is expected to be mainly on SMEs, although with some incidence on large companies and individual citizens, too The use of such conflict resolution services is predicted to occur only after 2015, but with regulatory cultural and social barriers Europe is relatively behind the USA and in the same position as Japan in online conflict resolutions The need for promotion and awareness actions taken jointly with regulation policy actions was identified International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Trustable translation services are important but not crucial to allow participants in the SEEM to collaborate across language borders The principal impact will be on SMEs and individual citizens across all member states (Bogataj and Pucihar 2007) Since it was not identified as a vital issue for eBusiness, the expected time to happen is predicted only in 2015 or after, with cultural and technological barriers Europe is relatively ahead of the USA and Japan through its cultural diversity The use of trustable translation services would require EU policy actions on research, training, education, promotion, and awareness Product traceability e-services are not a prerequisite for a complete product life cycle management in the SEEM If adopted, traceability services use will have impact mainly on SMEs and large companies, with a time horizon by 2015 or thereafter Technological, economic, and regulatory barriers are envisaged, putting Europe relatively behind the USA and Japan For this, there is a need of EU policy actions on IT standards, research, and regulation 4.5 Stakeholders vision on SEEM impact Opening the SEEM to support new work opportunities and increase mobility of information and knowledge for elderly and disabled people was not considered of high relevance (Table 6) The impact would be mainly on individual citizens and public administration Opening the SEEM to elderly and disabled people would occur only around 2015, with social, cultural, Table Stakeholders vision on SEEM impact 845 and economic barriers to be overcome Europe is relatively ahead of the USA and Japan on this issue, but still needs promotion, awareness, and EU policy actions regarding education and training Supply of solutions affordable for all, regardless of the business and company size are of high importance in the implementation of the SEEM concept The impact will be mainly on SMEs and individual citizens The expected time to happen is between 2010 and 2015 or even later, with mainly economic barriers Europe is relatively behind the USA and in the same position as Japan However, to achieve it, the EU policy actions on economic aspects, infrastructure, promotions, and awareness should be improved For the realisation of SEEM concept, a prerequisite that the SEEM would be accessible from everywhere at anytime in the EU at affordable costs was identified The consequence will have an impact mainly on individual citizens and SME, with a path to follow until 2015 with economic and technological barriers Europe is identified as relatively behind the USA and Japan, so there is a need to invest in infrastructure and economic actions The increase of the gap between rich and poor economies (First World and Third World), and the delocalisation of economic activities outside Europe, will not affect the creation of the SEEM, but there will exist an impact on individual citizens, and industry in general Europe is relatively in the same position as the USA and Japan on this issue, but EU policy actions on cultural, social, and economic aspects should be improved 846 R Jardim-Goncalves et al Discussion and final considerations: MSI and semiotics in the advent of SEEM The SEEM study indicates that electronic markets integration across Europe, including manufacturing systems, will be dependent on many other issues than technologies The study supports today’s vision on manufacturing systems integration, and the proposed frameworks of ATHENA and non-Technological Interoperability Parameters model, in which the technological dimension, namely systems standards and semantics where much R&D investment has been made over the years, though important, are far less relevant than the traditional perspective advocated As in other economical sectors, integration of manufacturing systems are dependent on non-technological issues like social aspects, policies and regulations, conflict resolution mechanisms, semantics and language agreements, legal and contractual arrangements, and trust and confidence mechanisms, that will overcome much of the MSI problems identified after implementation in real scenarios Grounded on the semiotics reference framework, and supported by the theories relating Social and Organisational Semiotics with MSI, it is possible to assert that all semiotic levels are of major relevance for achieving manufacturing systems integration in the context of the Single European Electronic Market Indeed, the most technology oriented dimensions, i.e physical, empirical, syntactic are as of today able to support MSI in SEEM However, the semantic level will require further developments in the foreseeable future, to sustain a more generalised approach of integration in SEEM and provide significant impact, as today available semantics can easily address one-to-one systems integration, but still many issues emerge with efforts to develop harmonised semantics for dynamic networked manufacturing environments Yet, where major developments must occur to make manufacturing systems integration on SEEM a reality is on non-technical levels, as the current stateof-art is very embryonic for the required needs, and there is not a established framework able to manage its metrics Thus, non-Technical Interoperability measurement indicators are of major relevance, to be used as a quantitative reference for the analysis of the level of integration of manufacturing systems Hence, social and organisational semiotics provide a sound background to gather the signs toward a stakeholders’ vision for the formulation of recommendations based upon industries and society requirements within the scope of SEEM, including those related with MSI, and quantified by the Overall Interoperability Score nT-IM Although the technological argument is often the focus of the discussion about the difficulties for the generalisation of achieving MSI, this paper concludes that indeed today this is hardly the key factor, as the non-technical aspect have been recognised as the core of the majority of the problems identified when implementing MSI Supported by a proper characterisation of the non-technical factors, through quantitative parameters the MIS measurement can be enabled by quantifiable non-technical indicators, as the proposed nT-IM Figure depicts this relationship, where the correlation (Semiotic Levels, Theories for MIS, SEEM issues) is quantified by the non-Technical Interoperability Measurement framework According to the stakeholders vision, the mapping of the identified relevant SEEM issues to be addressed by the theories relating social and organisational semiotics with MSI, are correlated to the Semiotic Levels according to Table The general SEEM issues can be tackled by the general social and semiotics theories, focused on the social, pragmatic, semantic and empirical semiotic levels Policies and regulations attach at a more extensive semiotic level, embracing also complex self-organisation systems theory Services issues are those covering wider theories and semiotic levels, having the technologies issue focused on the lowest level of the semiotics ladder, and not directly related to the general social theory Nevertheless, the foreseen impact concerns with the top levels of semiotics, i.e., those connected with the non-technical aspects of MIS, sustained by complex self-organising systems, and general social and semiotics theories Table provides the integrated analysis of challenges for implementation of MSI on SEEM, Figure Non-technical interoperability measurement and correlation with semiotic levels, theories for MIS and SEEM issues International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Table 847 Theories relating social and organisational semiotics of relevance for SEEM issues on the focus of semiotic levels according to the semiotic levels With reference to the semiotic levels, the identified major challenges for MSI on SEEM consider at social level the low influence of the EU public administration, and that support of the EU authorities is not key Nevertheless, at the social level, the English as an universal language bring barriers, together with market rules, business competitiveness and consumer protection needs Hence, worldwide online trust-enhancement service is a request, but not considered a best solution to have common online conflict resolution services This will bring an impact on supporting new work opportunities, increase mobility of information and knowledge, complemented with proper actions for education and training Pragmatic semiotics are of relevance for all SEEM issues, but not applied to the technologies In general, English becomes a lingua franca and is a pragmatism that will reinforce the success of MSI However, regulation is an important barrier to face, e.g., in manufacturing harmonised processes it must overcome regulatory and cultural barriers Whilst information about organisations and individuals is widely available, for pragmatic semiotics it should provide up-todate trust-related information about organisations and individuals, though independent certification agencies are not crucial Also, Open Source community is not a major player for the services implementation MSI cannot effectively be achieved without semantic interoperability In general, the semantics of the English words and expressions need to have worldwide seamless understanding, e.g., having available global ontologies for each of the operating manufacturing domains Through this, electronic documents can be created and managed automatically independent of the original language and organisation’s culture, especially if supported by technologies for fully interoperable registries supported by a common ontology, having the semantic-web as its cornerstone Thus, at such a pragmatic level, services would have trustable translation services as the basis of collaboration across language borders At syntactic level, policies and regulations should stimulate further predefined guidelines and common models, whilst technologies should improve the IT reference of the model standards, for instance delivering enhanced electronic and automatic translation services Hence, challenging MSI in the advent of SEEM, the observation, experience and experiment are key and dependent on the evidence and consequences that are generally observable The present experience of implementing advances collaboration platforms to facilitate the dynamic formation of visual organisations, together with common reference frameworks for advertisement and discovery of web services, and adoption of interoperable location-based services, though traceability of e-services is not a pre-requisite for a complete product life cycle management This produces an effective impact on empirical supply of solutions everywhere and affordable for all Although the physical semiotic level is the one where major research has been delivering, towards MSI implemented on SEEM, policies and regulations should reinforce harmonisation of electronic IDs and eSignatures, reducing technological barriers for advanced collaboration platforms, and making available everywhere at anytime, and with affordable costs, broadband communication and technologies and interoperable location-based services as providers To enable the measurement of the interoperability level characterised by the non-technical aspects of MSI, several indicators were established, mapping the semiotic levels with the SEEM issues Table summarises this study It can be observed that at semiotic social level, nT-IM is characterised at organisational structures by the contact points, and employees and work culture by linguistic barriers, responsibility and motivation The management of external relationships are described at the level of communication, whilst responsibility sharing and visibility are parameters for the collaborative processes 848 Table R Jardim-Goncalves et al Challenges for MSI on SEEM, according to the SEEM issues and semiotic levels International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Table 849 Characterisation by non-technical interoperability measurement of semiotic levels and SEEM issues characterisation, sustained by the background and foreground IPR protection and conflicts Honesty and efficiency of employees and work culture, together with the clarity of the strategy goals, are the basis for the pragmatic approach to achieve MSI in SEEM Nevertheless, semiotic pragmatism should embrace partners selection, cooperation contacts and conflict resolution, complemented with crossorganisational role mapping Measurement at semantic level, with focus on conflicts terminology and semantic conversion, is always supported by proper syntax for information systems application interoperability and clarity in collaborative processes design Impact on the collaboration breakdown, and partners assessment in the management of the external relationships, are indicators at empirical level, complementing the physical indicators for information systems data exchange tools, speed and security Acknowledgements The authors’ thanks go to the European Commission, which funded and supported the SEEMseed project IST-1-502512STP (Study, Evaluate, and Explore in the Domain of the Single Electronic European Market), and the SEEMseed project partners, and especially those colleagues who contributed to the preparation of the book, ‘The Road for SEEM: A Reference Framework Towards a Single European Electronic Market’ The authors also would like to thank the Fundac¸a˜o da Cieˆncia e Tecnologia for funding our research units References Abels, S., Campbell, S., and Hahn, A., 2004 Accessing and managing heterogeneous information in the Single European Electronic Market, October 2004 SEEM Enabling Technology, Vienna, Austria Andacht, Fernando, 2000 A Semiotic Framework for the Social Imaginary Programa de Po´s-Graduac¸a˜o em Cieˆncias da Comunicac¸a˜o, Unisinos (Universidade Vale Rio dos Sinos) Sa˜o Leopoldo, RS: Brasil Available from: http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/ aboutcsp/andacht/socimagn.htm 850 R Jardim-Goncalves et al ATHENA, 2007 D.A4.2: Specification of 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