Resource Frameworks for the Internet of Things

The first wave of the Internet of Things (IoT) was widespread but disorganized. SCADA operated nearly every industrial process, and was proprietary and the network rarely left the building. Power grid sensors and telemetry, if available, only extended to the substation. Home Security systems bundled sensors and a hardware-based app to provide fixed functionality. Building systems moved slowly off of pneumatics and onto digital controls. Hobbyists built apps on X10, but they enjoyed the making as much as the function. Over all of them, security was non-existent.

The second wave was the Internet of Sensors—thousands and thousands of sensors. These sensors were typically carefully placed. The meaning of the sensors came from the deliberate placement and recording of metadata.  Some of this was encoded in SensorML, but few sensors could describe themselves.  There were limited if intriguing demonstrations of sensors that could describe their locations, typically in the interoperability demonstrations of the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC). Wearable sensors were identified types that gained meaning through the person that wore them.

During the second wave, the low level descriptions were standardized in some domains. BACnet and LON and KNX identified standardized communications in buildings.  OPC, which began as OLE for Process control, matured into more robust protocols. OBIX normalized the base of communications to read, change, and interact with control systems. Higher level vertical smokestack ontologies such as MIMOSA saw limited acceptance.

The second wave began to transition to the next wave with efforts to homogenize systems and guide them through central control. One-size-fits-all cloud applications were the standard. The energy Standard Energy Profiles (SEP) treated all home systems as commodities, with identical energy use and minimal involvement of those who owned the systems. This created its own risks, as the fan and ducts for fume hoods, office cooling, and biohazard labs are all identical form distance. In homes, these were unpopular because most people do not want to cede control over their personal spaces and possessions to third parties.

The third wave will be built on Apps of Things, and ontologies based on composite semantics of sensors. The pervasive availability of the AllJoyn platform, as multi-platform open source, and now as a core component of Windows 10 will enable the wide development of Apps for Things. The Smart Television Alliance will soon bring its own App platform into consumer electronics and smart phones. The larger applications already in existence, for large building operations and the like, will gain some App characteristics.

Apps, as we know them on our smart phones, can be thought of as re-collecting and re-purposing feature sets for novel purposes. You may have a dozen apps on your phone that make use of the GIS functions and the SMS functions available. A sensor on a system component of your Smart Kitchen App may be used by an Aging at Home App to alert near-by relatives. Smart laundry systems already sends text when you can move clothes to the dryer. Smart EV chargers with their own storage may plan their strategies by consulting other Apps in the home.

More and more I think of Apps as the Device Drivers for the Internet of Things. My first commercial microcomputer app was a bubble sort that incorporated explicit memory mapping, explicit disk IO, and even disk head activity into a single hot mess of assembly code. It was a great relief to let the disc activity go as we got enough memory to support drivers, and later to stop moving blocks of memory around within business code. The first SCSI drives moved the disk IO out of the CPU and onto the device. RAID controllers are Apps that manage both IO optimization and fault recovery. Today the IO is off on network attached storage, with the technology optimization incorporated into the storage service. There are some conversations about using transactive frameworks to manage multi-application and multi-system allocation of storage services.

A growing challenge of overall efficiency is managing the interactions between these quite different Apps. A highly efficient dishwasher may reduce an instant hot water heater to the inefficiency of a peaker plant. Resource smoothing is of growing importance, not just for electric power, and not just to incorporate distributed energy. Resource frameworks, at the App level, can be a big part of that. This is why the Energy Mashup Lab joined the AllSeen Alliance—the cross-industry group pressing for wide adoption of the AllJoyn platform.

I will write more about the resource frameworks, from smart energy (EMIX) to the BIM for O&M (COBie), from UNITY to the Classification of Everyday Living (COEL). Come and see me at TechIntersection in Monterrey, California in mid-September (http://ow.ly/QSKGp), use my code CONSIDINE for a $50 Discount.

Flipping local Storage Benefits

I have been thinking about local microgrids encompassing local generation and local storage recently. Batteries get all the attention, but pre-consumption often open up the best means of storing energy.

For example, making ice-water when power is available, and cooling a building with ice water at a later time is storage based on pre-consumption. You were going to consume electrical power for cooling anyway. You instead consume it earlier than you need the cooling.

Most pre-consumption systems have been set up by utilities. A utility would fund the installation of a system such as the Ice Bear from Ice Energy. The Ice Energy web site talks almost exclusively about dispatch by the utility. This means the Ice Bear charges at night, when consumption is low. Comfort and amenity are barely mentioned on the Ice Energy site. Ice Bears are today sold as dispatchable power sources.

Note – I think Ice Energy is quite likely a best-in-class product. The above is the observed state of the utility-driven market, not a complaint about the technology. An Ice Bear can be installed alongside an existing compressor. A simple valve routes compressor-based cooling to the Ice Bear rather to Air Handler. A simple valve routes cooling from the Ice Bear to Air Handler rather than from Compressor. Retrofits are easy.

As we look to distributed energy, and to home and office microgrids, the Ice Bear-type control strategy changes. Instead of running off remote dispatch, it runs on local power production.

Today, a utility may ask an Ice Bear to be fully cooled overnight, in anticipation of hot day. Decisions are made based on predicted market shortages. Charging (cooling) an Ice Bear happens overnight.

In a Distributed Energy environment, the first rule is to use local power locally. The Ice Bear runs based on current site-based production. If a site has solar power, the Ice Bear will do its charging during the day. In the wind-driven mid-west, the Ice Bear would charge during the overnight wind.

This introduces the pre-consumption to the high-end consumer amenity market. In the steamy summer evenings suburban South, owners may be most conscious of cooling during the evening. Social activities flow naturally onto the back porch, alongside the compressor that is working steadily and noisily. Flow in and out the back door may make the host inch down the indoor temperature.

While I may have a home Ice Bear for efficiency or for distributed energy operation, I now have a new option. I could choose to have the Ice Bear fully charged before my soiree. During the evening’s social hours, the noisy compressor may not have to run at all. I like to listen to the overnight birdsongs, particularly the juvenile mockingbirds, while I sleep. I could opt to have the compressors never run while I am asleep, while still having the house boost the cooling power of the open window.

There are always more value-streams locally then there are for the central authority. This is part of why smart energy will inevitably be driven eventually by what Dr. Stephen Hall at the University of Leeds calls “a transition to a Civic Energy”. Civic Energy prefers decisions made by normal people. Service Oriented Energy is how we will get there. Normal people have their own values, and will be able to use smart energy to support them.

The Preconsumption Agent is one of the eight identified agent types identified in the roadmap of The Energy Mashup Lab.

Action of Second Continental Congress, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen United States of America

WHEN in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.

WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security. Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the present King of Great- Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid World.

HE has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

HE has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

HE has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People, unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only. 

HE has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures. 

HE has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People. 

HE has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of the Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and the Convulsions within.

HE has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

HE has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

HE has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and the Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

HE has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harrass our People, and eat out their Substance.

HE has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislatures.

HE has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

HE has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

FOR quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us; 

FOR protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: 

FOR cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World: 

FOR imposing Taxes on us without our Consent: 

FOR depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury: 

FOR transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended Offences: 

FOR abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rules into these Colonies:

FOR taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

FOR suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Power to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever. 

HE has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

HE has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

HE is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation. 

HE has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. 

HE has excited domestic Insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.

IN every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.

NOR have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of Consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.

WE, therefore, the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, in GENERAL CONGRESS, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as FREE AND INDEPENDENT STATES, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which INDEPENDENT STATES may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

The Great IoT Roll-Out

Today, is the largest roll-out of an open platform for the Internet of Things ever. So you have to be thinking, “How does this change my plans”

Today, millions of users are installing a securable open source IoT Platform. Users of Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1 are eligible for free upgrade to Windows 10. Windows 10 includes an AllJoyn server as a core service.

The developers of digital controls in buildings have long been pioneers in the Internet of Things (IoT). For a long time, a strong concern was how to keep these systems off the Internet, especially as the level of security in these technologies was so poor. For the home hobbyist, the IoT began in with the release of the X10 protocol in 1975. X10-based systems were only embraced by hobbyists, because unless it was your hobby, you would never tolerate the drudgery and significant weekend time to configure and operate your systems.

Despite all the buzz, the IoT has been a confusing mass of non-standard protocols and custom applications. In 2011, Qualcomm presented AllJoyn as a common framework for interacting with the IoT. The code was later open-sourced and presented to the Linux Foundation. In 2013, the AllSeen Alliance was formed to encourage adoption of the AllJoyn platform.

The AllSeen Alliance is more than startups and communications companies, although there are plenty of those. Old line computer companies such as Microsoft and Lenovo are members. Building centric companies that shun open source, such as Honeywell are members. NREL has signed on. By now, each of your customers has probably installed some AllJoyn in a building.

AllJoyn complements the Message Queueing Telemetry Transport (MQTT), and open source bridges between the two are available. While AllJoyn is designed to handle discovery and message transfer over a proximal [local] network or local network. AllJoyn interfaces can support need from control applications to media streaming. MQTT is a publish/subscribe framework in which a MQTT broker acts as a public IP addressable node. Publishers and subscribers connect through the broker. MQTT was designed for remote monitoring and control for most part. Most deployments of MQTT deployments use WAN network atop cellular technologies.

Last week, the OBIX Technical Committee voted out OBIX 1.1 to what I hope is the final public review. The focus of the entire effort was improved interoperability of different code-bases through more abstract formal information models. Standardized encodings enable easy and accurate exchange of messages from XML to JSON, the protocol of choice for today’s web developers, and COaP, a newer protocol appropriate for very large sensornets.

All this get especially interesting when you consider Bindings rather than Encodings. One of the new Bindings defined in OBIX is WebSocket. The Smart TV Alliance has embraced OBIX encoded in JSON and bound to WebSocket as a means to communicate between consumer electronics. To a growing degree, MQTT is being used as a lighter weight, higher performance variant of WebSocket, with binding gateways also available in Open Source.

We now have some standards that stir the pot in a way the pot has not been stirred for a while. With wireless network companies supporting the AllSeen Alliance, we may soon see the open source AllJoyn as an option on your home router. A home router is a natural gateway between a proximal network and a Pub/Sub network. Less open solutions such as ZigBee will need to re-position themselves.

Larger systems using formal controls schemas, and probably OBIX, will soon look to AllJoyn as a way to extend their situation awareness. Natural bridges between the Consumer Electronics Association with the Smart TV Alliance platform and AllJoyn-based applications come from compatible bindings, compatible encodings, and open standards.

What will really turbo-charge this is the cross-platform development environment that comes with Windows 10. It can come as no surprise that Microsoft is releasing DotNet development tools for AllJoyn applications. ROTOR has long supported DotNet on multiple platforms, but support for the advanced development libraries that make DotNet so valuable on Microsoft platforms has been spotty.

This changes with AllJoyn component on Windows 10. Each version of the pre-production DotNet AllJoyn library has been released on the same day for Windows, Android, and IOS. At the end of June, 2015, the high-touch Microsoft development environment is now available to for all three platforms in all DotNet Languages.

Building system programming has always been isolated, and not really up to consumer and corporate expectations. The bar is now raised. Time to polish up your your IoT plans.