Distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,
Welcome to the sixth edition of the IEEE International Workshop on Factory Communication Systems. It is well known that this event is the result of an ever increasing interest in communication technologies for automation in Europe and worldwide. This year's issue, WFCS 2006, is co-sponsored by the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, the Institute of Electronics and Computer and Communication Engineering of the Italian National Council of Research (IEIIT-CNR) and the Torino chapter of the Italian National Association for Automation (ANIPLA). Additional support comes from the Politecnico di Torino, the Research Institute Mario Boella, the local government institutions (City of Torino, Provincia di Torino and Regione Piemonte) as well as industry sponsors for the satellite event of the Industry Day.
The first IEEE Workshop on Factory Communication Systems was held in Leysin, Switzerland, in 1995. The main goal of that workshop was to provide an open forum for researchers to both present their original results as well as to exchange ideas on latest developments in factory and industrial communications. Subsequent events were held biennially and hosted in Barcelona/Spain (1997), Västerås/Sweden (2000), Porto/Portugal (2002) and Vienna/Austria (2004), respectively. For over a decade there has always been a continual and significant broadening of the scope of WFCS, which now spans several appealing areas such as communication systems for industrial and building automation, automotive and vehicular communications, industrial wireless networks, real-time communications, web-based communications and applications, distributed application platforms, and fault tolerance, security and safety in industrial networks.
Since its first edition WFCS has always been an outstanding success. Thanks to the hardworking efforts of a large number of volunteers over the past one and a half years, WFCS 2006 is no exception. We have three full days of great technical papers preceded by an “Industry Day” with a very stimulating technical program, a total of about 60 papers from all over the world.
We have done our best to design the Program of the workshop so as to respond to your needs whether you are a long-term WFCS fellow or new to this Community. Our goal is to help you understand and advance the “state-of-the-art” in communications for automation through our papers, keynote sessions, public and panel discussions and work-in-progress presentations.
It is well known that the success of events like this one cannot be possible without the help and strong self-commitment of a lot of people. We want to personally thank all committee and supporting staff members, who have worked for a successful WFCS 2006, for their tremendous efforts. It was a real privilege to work with you. In particular, we would like to acknowledge the contributions of the Organising Co-chairs, Richard Zurawski and Thilo Sauter, who brought valuable experience to the organisation of WFCS 2006. Our special thanks are also to the Program Co-chairs, Gianluca Cena and Francisco Vasques, for setting up a top-class scientific program and to the Work-in-progress Co-chairs, Ivan Cibrario Bertolotti and Christer Norström, for contributing to select a challenging WIP technical program.
Promoting interactions between industry and academia has always been of fundamental importance in the WFCS areas of interest. However, this goal couldn’t have been achieved without the impressive work of the Industry Day Co-chairs Stefano Vitturi and Martin Wollschlaeger.
Finally we are also grateful to the Local Organising Committee and all the people in the backstage. Evidence of their valuable work can be found everywhere around you, from the Program leaflet in your hands to the Proceedings and, in general, in the logistic infrastructure that has been set-up to help and support you at the workshop.
We know that Torino is proud to host WFCS 2006 and we are sure that the industrial tradition of this city, together with its attention to innovation, builds up an excellent framework for the sixth edition of the workshop. However, as the 2006 Olympic Winter Games has recently shown, Torino is much more than this, of course. We invite you to discover its beautiful monuments, galleries and museums, walk through its streets, meet its industrious and proud people and taste its delicious food, chocolates and wines...Torino will surprise you with a well balanced blend of its Italian historical and cultural heritage and international vocation to modern science and technology.
For more than ten years WFCS has been the premier international forum for researches, practitioners and developers to come together and share and discuss ideas, review trends and propose new research directions. We hope you will take full advantage of these days to learn new things, meet new people, and advance your own knowledge and experiences.
Thank you for coming to WFCS 2006!
Adriano Valenzano and Josep Fuertes
WFCS 2006 General Co-Chairmen