Optimal supervisory control of finite state automata

This paper presents optimal supervisory control of dynamical systems that can be represented by deterministic finite state automaton (DFSA) models. The performance index for the optimal policy is obtained by combining a measure of the supervised plant language with (possible) penalty on disabling of controllable events. The signed real measure quantifies the behaviour of controlled sublanguages based on a state transition cost matrix and a characteristic vector as reported in earlier publications. Synthesis of the optimal control policy requires at most n iterations, where n is the number of states of the DFSA model generated from the unsupervised plant language. The computational complexity of the optimal control synthesis is polynomial in n. Syntheses of the control algorithms are illustrated with two application examples.