This triad can be generalized as valid for complex technical objects in general. Semantically, all processes imply flows. A process modifies or controls a flow. The modifier is another flow meeting the first by a solid arrangement of contact. Syntactically, processes combine when the flow of one process modifies the flow in another.
Syntactic composition determines the order and structure of modifications and controls.
External control expresses the intentional user and the application of the technical object to practical domains. All of these instances can be schematized. Dynamic modelling accounts directly for the normativity of all instances of control. Composition in technical design is intelligible, in so far as it is interpreted by schemes that interrelate sign-shaped meanings. By a close study of machine diagrams, and the development of appropriate semiotic concepts and graphics for the structures they refer to, we intend to obtain a semiotic understanding of our technical understanding, and thereby, a new approach to the still more important problems raised by contemporary technological culture as a human environment.