Energy operations across domains

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2017147022-A1
Application number	US-201514946574-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Nov 19, 2015
Priority date	Nov 19, 2015
Publication date	May 25, 2017
Grant date	—

Abstract

For energy operations across domains, a method generates a native node and a foreign node. The method further generates protocol reference data that identifies protocol specific relationships between the native node and the foreign node under an address space. In addition, the method links the native node and the foreign node in a native namespace and a foreign namespace by a translation function that automatically converts information between the foreign data structure and the proxy data structure using protocol specific structure converting functions. The method maps a native method calling of the native node to a foreign method calling of the foreign node using a protocol specific method mapping function.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . A method comprising:
generating, by use of a processor, a native node comprising a proxy data structure that is defined with a native protocol and that represents information of a proxy device in a native namespace, and a foreign node comprising a foreign data structure that is defined with a foreign protocol and that represents information of a foreign device in a foreign namespace; generating protocol reference data that identifies protocol specific relationships between the native node and the foreign node under an address space; linking the native node and the foreign node in the native namespace and the foreign namespace by a translation function that automatically converts information between the foreign data structure and the proxy data structure using protocol specific structure converting functions; and mapping a native method calling of the native node to a foreign method calling of the foreign node using a protocol specific method mapping function.

2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the proxy data structure comprises translation variables that correspond to variables of the foreign data structure of the foreign node.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein the translation variables are organized as OPC Unified Architecture (UA) Variable Nodes with domain specific structured data types.

4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the address space is an OPC Unified Architecture (UA) address space and an OPC UA server maintains a plurality of native nodes and a plurality of foreign nodes.

5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the translation function comprises a network of domain specific OPC Unified Architecture (UA) nodes in the OPC UA server address space, the address space comprising a node network wherein nodes of Object, Variable, Method and Reference types are interconnected.

6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the translation function automatically converts the foreign data structure variables to the proxy data structure translation variables and the proxy data structure translation variables to the foreign data structure variables by calling a conversion function that converts a pair of data types between the data structure and the proxy data structure.

7 . The method of claim 5 , wherein the translation function automatically links the information by:
establishing a subscription instance with a publisher and a subscriber; detecting modified data in the foreign data structure in response to the publisher polling the foreign data structure; notifying of an update event from the publisher to the subscriber; and converting the modified data to the proxy data structure in response to the update event.

8 . The method of claim 1 , the method further comprising dynamically configuring translation functions of an OPC Unified Architecture (UA) server by:
receiving a pairing of the foreign device and the proxy device by UA messages; determining a protocol and application information for the foreign device, wherein the application information comprises foreign device specific information required by the proxy device; and generating the native node and the foreign node in response to determining the protocol and the application information of the foreign device.

9 . The method of claim 1 , the method further comprising statically configuring translation functions of an OPC Unified Architecture (UA) server by generating UA nodes of the proxy data structure and the foreign data structure from a parsed Extensible Markup Language (XML) file.

10 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the native node method calling is a power management function and invokes the foreign node method calling of the foreign node.

11 . The method of claim 10 , the method further comprising communicating a permission request to a foreign controller that manages the foreign device and receiving a permission grant from the foreign controller prior to communicating the native method calling to the foreign device.

12 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the foreign method calling of the foreign node is invoked in response to translated data structure data, the translated data structure data comprising one or more of sensor data and state information from one or more foreign devices in one or more foreign nodes.

13 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the foreign controller is one of an industrial automation controller, a building automation controller, and domain specific supervisor, and the permission grant is generated based on a state of a domain specific application associated with the foreign controller.

14 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the power management function modifies a foreign device power level to a modified power level if a modified power level satisfies a power level policy.

15 . The method of claim 14 , wherein the power level policy is satisfied if an occupancy is less than an occupancy threshold.

16 . The method of claim 14 , wherein the modified power level comprises one or more of reduced lighting and reduced heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) settings.

17 . An apparatus comprising:
a non-transitory memory, communicatively coupled to a processor, the non-transitory memory storing code that performs: generating a native node comprising a proxy data structure that is defined with a native protocol and that represents information of a proxy device in a native namespace, and a foreign node comprising a foreign data structure that is defined with a foreign protocol and that represents information of a foreign device in a foreign namespace; generating protocol reference data that identifies protocol specific relationships between the native node and the foreign node under an address space; linking the native node and the foreign node in the native namespace and the foreign namespace by a translation function that automatically converts information between the foreign data structure and the proxy data structure using protocol specific structure converting functions; and mapping a native method calling of the native node to a foreign method calling of the foreign node using a protocol specific method mapping function.

18 . The apparatus of claim 17 , wherein the proxy data structure comprises translation variables that correspond to variables of the foreign data structure of the foreign node and the translation variables are organized as OPC Unified Architecture (UA) Variable Nodes with domain specific structured data types.

19 . A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored there on that, in response to execution, cause a system comprising a processor to perform operations comprising:
generating a native node comprising a proxy data structure that is defined with a native protocol and that represents information of a proxy device in a native namespace, and a foreign node comprising a foreign data structure that is defined with a foreign protocol and that represents information of a foreign device in a foreign namespace; generating protocol reference data that identifies protocol specific relationships between the native node and the foreign node under an address space; linking the native node and the foreign node in the native namespace and the foreign namespace by a translation function that automatically converts information between the foreign data structure and the proxy data structure using protocol specific structure converting functions; and mapping a native method calling of the native node to a foreign method calling of the foreign node u

Assignees

• Rockwell Automation Tech Inc

Inventors

• Zhang Guolin
• Brandt David D
• Flek Ondrej
• Kaufman Philip J
• Como Christopher W
• Rischar Charles M

Classifications

• G05F1/66 Primary

  Regulating electric power · CPC title

• H04L43/10

  Active monitoring, e.g. heartbeat, ping or trace-route · CPC title

• G05B15/02

  electric · CPC title

• H04L12/403

  with centralised control, e.g. polling · CPC title

• H04L67/28

  Electricity · mapped topic