IIC Journal of Innovation | Page 83

A PoV on the IIC Industrial Internet Reference Architecture    Integration –The ability of different components within an IIS to communicate with each other using agreed upon network protocols and exchange data. This has also been referred to as Technical Interoperability. Interoperability –The ability to exchange information via messages with agreed upon syntax (or structure) and semantics (or meaning of symbols used in messages). Composability –The ability of components to interact with other components to create desired effects and satisfy end user requirements based on the expected behavior of the participating components. Connectivity is a key capability that enables Integration and Interoperability. 3.4 Connectivity The IIRA describes connectivity in terms of two main functional layers. They are as follows:   Communication Transport Layer – The role of this layer is to provide Technical Interoperability. This layer corresponds to the combination of Physical, Data Link, Network and Transport Layers of the OSI Reference Model. Underlying networks and protocols are completely specified and agreed upon by communicating components to ensure that data can be exchanged between them. Communication Framework Layer – The role of this layer is to provide syntactic interoperability. It corresponds to the Sessions, Presentation and Application layers of the OSI model. Syntactic interoperability requires message structure and data formats to be completely specified and independent of the actual component implementation. Communication Gateways are used to extend the reach of communication across different transport networks and across different Communication Framework implementations. 3.5 Data Management Data Management is a foundational capability on which functions in the Control, Operations and Information domains depend. Data Management is performed on hosts and endpoints in the Platform and Edge tiers. Types of data that are common in an IIS include sensor observations, alerts and events, command and control signals and configuration data. The most common data management functions in an IIS include data ingestion, cleaning, filtering, sampling, compression, feature extraction and transformation. Data storage, meta data management and search/discovery services are other common data management functions. - 82 - December 2015