Patent ID: 8812262

Claim:
A field device for determining or monitoring a process variable in process automation, comprising: a sensor, which works according to a defined measuring principle; and a control/evaluation unit, which conditions and evaluates measurement data delivered by said sensor along at least three equal valued measuring paths as a function of a safety standard required in a particular safety-critical application, wherein: said measuring paths are designed with dynamically reconfigurable function modules diversely; said control/evaluation unit is embodied at least partially as a reconfigurable logic chip with a plurality of partially dynamically reconfigurable function modules; said control/evaluation unit configures said function modules in said measuring paths as a function of the safety-critical application, that the field device is designed corresponding to the required safety standard; said control/evaluation unit partially dynamically, or dynamically, reconfigures said function modules serially or in parallel for an uneven number of diverse measuring paths; said control/evaluation unit reconfigures digital hardware based and/or analog hardware based and/or software based, function modules in each of the measuring paths; at least one of the measuring paths is provided with at least one analog function module, which is embodied as a dynamically reconfigurable FPAA; said control/evaluation unit compares data made available from, by or in the measuring paths with one another; and said control/evaluation unit generates a warning report, that a defined measuring path is delivering defective data, when data made available on the defined measuring path deviate from data of the remaining measuring paths.