Automation (ancient Greek: = self dictated) or Industrial Automation is the use of computers to control industrial machinery and processes, replacing human operators. It is a step beyond mechanization, where human operators are provided with machinery to help them in their jobs. The most visible part of automation can be said to be industrial robotics. Some advantages are repeatability, tighter quality control, waste reduction, integration with business systems, increased productivity and reduction of labour. Some disadvantages are high initial costs and increased dependence on maintenance.

By the middle of the 20th century, automation had existed for many years on a small scale, using mechanical devices to automate the production of simply shaped items. However the concept only became truly practical with the addition of the computer, whose flexibility allowed it to drive almost any sort of task. Computers with the required combination of power, price, and size first started to appear in the 1960s, and since then have taken over the vast majority of assembly line tasks (some food production/inspection being a notable exception).

In most cases specialised hardened computers referred to as PLCs (Programmable Logic Controllers) are used to synchronize the flow of inputs from sensors and events with the flow of outputs to actuators and events. This leads to precisely controlled actions that permit a tight control of the process or machine.

Human-Machine Interfaces (HMI) are usually employed to communicate to PLCs. e.g.: To enter and monitor temperatures or pressures to be maintained.

Another form of automation that involves computers is called test automation, where computers are programmed to mimic what human testers do when manually testing software applications. This is accomplished by using test automation tools to produce special scripts (written as computer programs) that tell the computer exactly what to do in order to run the same manual tests.

Social issues of automation

Automation raises several important social issues. Among them is automation's impact on employment/unemployment.

Some argue automation leads to higher employment. One author made that case here: When automation was first introduced, it caused widespread fear. It was thought that the displacement of human workers by computerized systems would lead to unemployment (this also happened with mechanization, centuries earlier). In fact the opposite was true, the freeing up of the labor force allowed more people to enter information jobs, which are typically higher paying. One odd side effect of this shift is that "unskilled labor" now pays very well in most industrialized nations, because fewer people are available to fill such jobs leading to supply and demand issues.

Some, such as technocrats, argue the reverse, at least in the long term. First, automation has only just begun and short-term conditions might partially obscure its long-term impact. For instance many manufacturing jobs left the United States during the early 1990s, but a massive upscaling of IT jobs at the same time offset this as a whole.

It appears that automation does devalue unskilled labor through its replacement with less-expensive machines, however the overall effect of this on the workforce as a whole remains unclear. Today automation of the workforce in the "western world" is quite advanced, yet during the same period the general wellbeing of its citizens has increased dramatically. What role automation played in these changes has not been well studied.

Literature

David Noble, Forces of Production: a social history of industrial automation, New York: Knopf 1984

See also: industrial data processing, domotics, luddism, John Sargrove