Industrial gateways and industrial IoT gateways

Industrial gateway
Industrial-grade IoT gateway is a data transmission device that fully supports mobile, Unicom and telecommunication 4G / 3G / 2G communication networks. The 4G intelligent gateway completes two-way, transparent communication between serial devices and servers, and between serial devices and serial devices. , Wireless transmission, IoT gateway has the characteristics of simple application, USB / Bluetooth setting parameters, long-distance maintenance, etc. It can easily develop user monitoring software or connect to third-party application channels through cloud channel forwarding, protocol development kits, and network to serial tools.
Wutong Bolian smart gateways such as: WG585 smart gateway

2.3.1 Fundamental functions
The so-called gateway is primarily responsible for the connection of two heterogeneous networks. This is particularly common in industrial IoT scenarios. Because sensor networks often use electrical signals and protocols that are completely different from the general network layer (long-haul network). The basic functions of the industrial gateway are shown in Figure 2-1.


2.3.1.1 Perception Layer Signal Interface
The main task is to dock the signals of various devices in the sensor network. This module contains hardware interfaces for connecting different electrical signals, as well as software for corresponding data collection and instruction sending. In order to cope with the complexity of the perception layer, the manufacturers of industrial gateways generally equip a hardware interface and protocol combination of the signal interface of the perception layer according to their target application areas.

2.3.1.2 Network layer signal interface
The primary task is to connect the signals at the network layer. Compared with the signal interface at the perception layer, the signal interface at the network layer is generally much simpler. Since only one standard long-distance network and its protocol are generally required in the entire system, the corresponding hardware interface and data transmission and reception software are relatively single. However, this is not to say that it can only support one type. In practical applications, manufacturers of industrial gateways are often designed to support a variety of long-distance transmission networks for product versatility. The detailed method can be a method in which multiple interfaces are equipped at the same time, or it can be a method in which the product is designed to be equipped with a plug-in card, so that users can choose different equipment to be equipped at the time of shipment.

2.3.1.3 Data processing
Data processing on the device side deals with data mismatches. In other words, the scope, frequency, and completeness of the data required by the server are different. The purpose of data processing is to organize the data entered by the input interface, transform it into a data method suitable for output, and push it to the output interface. The input and output sides here can be played by both the device side and the server side, so the data activity is two-way, and there are differences due to different types of data.

2.3.1.4 In-place database
In some scenarios, the processed data also needs to be stored in the gateway's local database, so that complex data processing processes or other local transaction logic processing can be used. Because industrial gateways are generally classified as embedded accounting equipment, this type of database also generally uses embedded databases. The functions of the embedded database are relatively simple. Generally, there is a memory buffer to improve the access speed.

2.3.1.5 In-place transaction logic
The first is to deal with the transaction logic of the part of the system related to the devices, sensors and actuators connected to the part of the sensor network connected to the gateway. The richness and complexity of the local transaction logic modules of different gateways vary widely. If there is no such functional module in an industrial gateway, it is often referred to as a data transparent gateway, and may be called a protocol converter and a communication handler. . For a detailed description of in-place transaction logic, see "Marginal Accounting".

2.3.1.6 Other functions
In addition to the above primary modules, a gateway is often equipped with its functional user interface, which can be selected from the keypad, command line (via telnet or serial port), or graphical interface mode (such as built-in WEBServer or even with a panel). If the gateway has in-place transaction logic, it may also require tools to load script files and equipment files required by the local transaction logic.

Another category and its important modules are security modules. As with general network equipment, security is an essential design consideration. In addition to defending against external network intrusions, it is also necessary to consider the issue of identity authentication when the device is connected to the server, that is, only legitimate devices can connect to the server. This requires that each device-side member (industrial gateway or smart device) must have a unique identification mark and authorization mark to enter the Industrial Internet of Things, otherwise it can be accessed by an implied external malicious device, and then interfere with the entire system. Normal operation. Similarly, the device can only access the legitimate server, otherwise the server will be interfered with the normal operation of the device.
As a long-distance device, the industrial gateway's self-protection is also important. It is generally required that it should take advantage of its own connection to the server, be able to automatically download its own software update package from the server and complete the update. Some settings and equipment operations should also be able to complete through long-distance login, and then reduce the cost of on-site protection of the dispatched personnel. And improve the response speed to user needs.

2.3.2 Technical completion

Industrial gateways generally adopt embedded architectures to accomplish this. The system is equipped with the required interface hardware according to the type of electrical interface supported by the design. The processor may adopt a dedicated SoC, such as based on ARM, MIPS and other architectures, or it may be a low-end Intel X86 CPU with a general PC architecture. At the same time, it is necessary to equip the necessary amount of memory and storage equipment in order to support the calculation and storage of data and equipment parameters. The operating system is often a variety of embedded operating systems, during which Linux is now more prevalent. As a communication processing equipment, it is naturally necessary to equip the necessary types of communication protocol analysis modules. The communication protocol analysis is based on the characteristics of the protocol and the operating system. It may be a process in the user mode or a process in the kernel mode of the operating system. Then there is the data processing module as the center of the entire gateway. The data processing module is mainly completed by software and the main processor, but it is not excluded that in some scenarios, a coprocessor such as a GPU is selected for speeding up. Transaction logic and embedded databases are grouped into optional parts, plus necessary user interfaces and other applications. Security mechanisms should behave appropriately at all levels.

In the programming language of the software, C / C ++ is generally the first choice for embedded devices with low accounting ability but certain real-time requirements, but this has not prevented developers from using shell, java, Python in the gateway. Waiting for high-end speech enthusiasm. Because in the low-frequency operation of the user equipment interface, the development power of using these high-end speech is high, and even if the performance is poor in these low-frequency operations, it will not cause performance problems in daily operation. In the scene where the on-site sensing layer has to be changed due to the instability of the user's transaction process, the gateway has to change equipment and even require a certain on-site secondary development. The rapid development ability provided by this high-end language may be Increasingly necessary.

Industrial Internet of Things is one of iJUNCO's operating priorities. Customers in need are welcome to call us.