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As reported on SmartIndustry.com, the OPC Foundation recently announced an array of new initiatives and developments that reflects its continued focus on the specification’s role as a central interoperability standard for the emerging Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT).
The first announcement is interesting because it now supports both client/server and publish/subscribe. This means that an end user gets the benefits of both. Pub/sub is seen as key functionality to support Cloud-based applications, because pub/sub protocols are a better fit when the infrastructure is unknown. Pub/sub protocols are more scalable because the decoupling of producers and consumers allows each to be added and removed independently. That said, securing these protocols is more complex than client/server because there are more pieces involved. They can also have interoperability issues given the lose coupling of the producer and consumer.
The second announcement pulls together the two seemingly competitive protocols. DDS is not considered as being well positioned as an integration point between industry and IT which had to do with its decentralized network management. The collaboration might help address this. The two protocols are seen as complementary because there is little overlap in their applications.
Making the protocol available as open-source increases the access by academia and research organizations, and should lead to greater adoption. The open source repository of OPC UA is now available on the open source GitHub web site at http://github.com/opcfoundation.
The fourth announcement is intriguing as it reflects Microsoft's recognition of OPC's dominance and relevance in the manufacturing realm and a need for this level of connectivity to create better value for cloud-based business models. It should be noted that Microsoft has been involved with the OPC Foundation since the mid-90s.
Interoperability continues to be a concern with IIoT. The collaboration between OMG and OPC is a positive move.
- The Foundation announced support for publish/subscribe communication functionality. This functionality will complement OPC UA’s client/server architecture and will be critical to supporting the integration of “cloud-side” IT protocols.
- It announced a collaborative strategy with the Object Management Group to support complementary usage of OPC with the OMG’s Data Distribution Service (DDS) standard, a key publish/subscribe protocol for distributed real-time systems.
- It announced that the OPC UA specification has been open-sourced, and is now readily accessible to suppliers, end users, academics and research organizations that would like to assess OPC UA technology.
- A new seat on the Foundation board of directors was created for Microsoft’s Matt Vasey, director of IoT business development, in a nod to the growing importance of interoperability with not only industrial automation systems but cloud/IT systems as well.
The first announcement is interesting because it now supports both client/server and publish/subscribe. This means that an end user gets the benefits of both. Pub/sub is seen as key functionality to support Cloud-based applications, because pub/sub protocols are a better fit when the infrastructure is unknown. Pub/sub protocols are more scalable because the decoupling of producers and consumers allows each to be added and removed independently. That said, securing these protocols is more complex than client/server because there are more pieces involved. They can also have interoperability issues given the lose coupling of the producer and consumer.
The second announcement pulls together the two seemingly competitive protocols. DDS is not considered as being well positioned as an integration point between industry and IT which had to do with its decentralized network management. The collaboration might help address this. The two protocols are seen as complementary because there is little overlap in their applications.
Making the protocol available as open-source increases the access by academia and research organizations, and should lead to greater adoption. The open source repository of OPC UA is now available on the open source GitHub web site at http://github.com/opcfoundation.
The fourth announcement is intriguing as it reflects Microsoft's recognition of OPC's dominance and relevance in the manufacturing realm and a need for this level of connectivity to create better value for cloud-based business models. It should be noted that Microsoft has been involved with the OPC Foundation since the mid-90s.
Interoperability continues to be a concern with IIoT. The collaboration between OMG and OPC is a positive move.