ADAPTIVE ALARM CONTROLLER CHANGES MULTIPLE INPUTS TO INDUSTRIAL CONTROLLER IN ORDER FOR STATE WORD TO CONFORM WITH STORED WORD

An industrial controller monitors its state as comprised of selected inputs and outputs for a present time period and a previous time period. Each current state is compared to a previously acquired list of stored states to detect possible errors in inputs to the industrial controller and to find the closest match of the current state to a previously stored state. This "closest match word" is used to identify erroneous inputs to the industrial controller and to determine whether the controlled process must be halted. The closest match word may be substituted for the current state to permit the controlled process to continue.