Patent ID: 7461171

Claim:
A method of providing process data to a client from a server in an Industrial Automation System, the method comprising the steps of: receiving an unspecific request for runtime process data of a process, which is at least a process controlled and monitored by the Industrial Automation System, from the client by the server, wherein the request serves to initiate a data transfer from the server to the client and wherein the request contains an incomplete specification of structure and kind of process data/content to be provided by the server such that the server is enabled to decide which data shall be sent to the client; determining within the server a kind of process data to be provided to the client; selecting as process data from the determined kind of data either all up-to-date process data or a subset of process data; determining a data structure for communicating the process data to the client; generating an XML type message comprising meta data being descriptive of the kind and the data structure of the process data and comprising the process data; and sending the XML type message to the client.