1. A configuration facility for specifying a deployment model for supervisory process control and manufacturing information applications for associating application objects to particular physical computing devices and providing a view of the distribution of the objects upon the physical computing devices, the configuration facility comprising: a processor; one or more memory storage devices coupled to the processor; platform definitions, stored on the one or more memory storage devices, specifying one or more physical computing device types; engine definitions, stored on the one or more memory storage devices, specifying engines that execute upon the physical computing devices and thereby define types of services supported by the physical computing devices; a plurality of application objects, stored on the one or more memory storage devices, being identified by location independent object names; area definitions, stored on the one or more memory storage devices, specifying areas comprising logical groupings of the plurality of application objects, wherein each application object of the plurality of application objects is assigned a handle derived from an association with a specified area in which each application object is grouped; a set of hierarchical relationships specifying assignments of the engines to particular ones of the physical computing devices, and assignments of the areas to particular ones of the engines; and a deployment view generator, executed by the processor, depicting, in accordance with the set of hierarchical relationships, a hierarchy of physical computing devices, engines, and areas; wherein a first application object is configured to communicate with a second application object through an engine hosting at least one of the areas to which the first application object is assigned using the assigned handle of the second application object.