Wonderware Application Server security is applied to the ArchestrA IDE, the System Management Console (SMC), and the runtime data level. At the runtime data level which centralizes the definition of all permissions to the ApplicationObjects. These ApplicationObjects can be accessed by a variety of clients but the security is centrally defined allowing ease of maintenance. The users that are allowed to modify these ApplicationObjects at runtime are mapped to the objects by user defined roles. These roles can be mapped directly to existing groups in a Microsoft Domain or workgroup.