Material model

MaterialInformation

The main structuring element of the schema definition is MaterialInformation.

MaterialLot

A material lot object uniquely identifies a specific amount of material, countable or weighable. This describes the actual total quantity or amount of material available, its current state, and its specific property values.

MaterialLot elements may be used to contain information about specific material and subsets of the material stored as sublots. It may also include the definition of QA test results. It may include the list of material definitions the material belongs to and the list of QA test specifications associated with properties.

MaterialSublot

A material lot may be stored as separately identifiable quantities. Each separate identifiable quantity of the material is identified in a material sublot. All material sublots must contain the same material lot, so they use the material lot element’s property values. A material sublot may be just a single item. Material sublots may have sublot specific properties, such as RFID tag IDs or other identification properties, maintained in a MaterialSublotProperty element.

Each material sublot also contains the location of the sublot, the quantity or amount of material available in the sublot, and a reference to the material lot. Material sublots may contain other sublots. For example, a sublot may be a pallet, each box on the pallet may also be a sublot, and each material blister pack in the box may also be a sublot.

MaterialDefinition

A material definition is a means to describe goods with similar characteristics for purposes of scheduling and planning. Examples of these may be “City Water”, “HCl”, and “Grade B Aluminum”. The materials may be identified as raw, intermediate, or final and may have other state information, such as availability of safety information.

MaterialDefinition information may be used to contain information about material definitions. It may contain the list of material lots belonging to the definition and the list of QA test specifications associated with material definition properties.

MaterialClass

A material class is means of defining groupings material definitions for use in production scheduling or processing. An example of a material class is "Sweetener", with members of "Fructose", "Corn Syrup", and "Sugar Cane Syrup". Another example of a material class is "Water", with members of "City Water", "Recycled Water", and "Spring Water". A material definition may belong to zero or more material classes.

MaterialClass information may be used to contain information about material classes. It may contain the list of material definitions belonging to the class and the list of QA test specifications associated with material class properties.

QATestSpecification

A QA test specification may be associated with a material class property. This is typically used where a test is required to ensure that the material has the required property value. A QA test specification may identify a test for one or more material class properties. Not all properties need to have a defined QA test specification.

QATestSpecification information may be used to contain information about QA (Quality Assurance) tests. It may contain identifications of the tested material properties and the tested material class properties.