Patent ID: 7774167

Claim:
A method of providing diagnosis information and carrying out a process diagnosis therewith in an automation system, comprising: providing a plurality of components to the automation system, at least some of the components comprising a diagnosis interface for transmitting diagnosis information related to the respective component; forming at least one component group including at least some of the components; interrelating the diagnosis information of the at least some of the components to form group diagnosis information; and providing the group diagnosis information, wherein the components and the component groups are assigned to classes, each class defining functions and attributes of the assigned components or component groups, wherein the diagnosis information includes rules for logically combining input variables and for providing at least one output variable based on the combined input variables, wherein a single-level logic maps logic of one component of the diagnosis hierarchy and a multi-level logic maps logic of the component group, the single-level logic logically combining internal information of the component, and wherein the classes are a basis for creation of the single-level logic and multi-level logic.