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Axeda Data Model

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The Axeda Platform has a mature data model that's important to understand when planning to build applications. First, this will introduce the existing objects and how they relate to each other.

Axeda Agents can communicate

  • Model – the definition of a type of asset. The model consists of a set of dataitems (its inputs and outputs) and alarms. The platform applies logic to a model, so as assets grow, the system is scalable in terms of management.
  • Asset – or sometimes called Device. An asset has an identifier called a Serial Number which must be unique within its model. Agents report information in terms of the asset. Logic is applied to data and events about that asset.
  • Dataitem – a named reading, such as a sensor or computer value. Dataitems are timestamped values in a sequence. For example, hourly temperatures, or odometer readings, or daily usage statistics. The number of named dataitems is unlimited. Dataitems can be written as well as read, so a value can be sent to an “output”. A dataitem can be a Digital (boolean), Analog (real value) or a String.
  • Mobile Location - a lat/long pair typically read from GPS. This is used to map assets as they move.
  • Alarms – have a name, severity, description, active flag, timestamp, and optional embedded dataitem and value. Alarms sent from an agent may result from logic that detects a condition, or from traps, error codes, etc. An alarm indicates something that's wrong.
  • Files – arbitrary files can be uploaded from an agent. Files are sent with a Hint string. This is metadata that allows rules to process the file based on something other than the file extension. Files are often uploaded when an alarm has been raised, or on demand from a user or rule.


Axeda agents have flexible ways to send and receive this information based on time, data changes, user request, etc. The Adaptive Machine Messaging Protocol (AMMP) allows anyone to make an agent that interacts with Axeda Platform using the same data model. Axeda Platform is asset-centric. An asset is an instance of a Model. Each asset is identified by its Model and Serial Number pair. Associated with an asset is


  • Organization (typically the customer)
  • Location or home of the asset (a street address). A location is in a Region.
  • Contacts – people who have a relationship to the asset. Contacts have a role, such as Owner, or Service Agent.
  • Asset Groups – assets are members of groups, and groups can be used to grant privileges, for navigation, or to apply commands.
  • Properties – are additional named attributes of an asset. Properties do not have a time series history like a dataitem. The value of a property may be used to dynamically group assets.
  • Condition – the current condition may be good, warning, error, or needs maintenance, based on the existence of alarms, for example.
  • And, of course, dataitems, alarms and files.


Information is processed and organized in the context of an asset, but the processing is managed for models. The only scalable way to manage a lot of assets is to apply rules by kind of asset, not individual assets.


Rules apply logic to data as it happens. When a new dataitem is reported, a rule may check against its threshold. When an alarm is created, a rule may create a trouble ticket, or notify the user. All types of rules in the platform – Expression Rules, State Machines, and Threshold Rules – are event based. Rules apply to models, or sometimes to all (such as a standard way of notification on Alarms). The only exceptions are rules that apply to user logins and rules on a system timer.


Software packages are another entity in the Platform. Packages are used to distribute files, software, patches, etc. and to script some commands around their delivery. So packages often upgrade or patch software, or load a new option of help file. Packages are defined for a model, and the deployment may be automatic or manual, to one or many.User logins are members of user groups.


User groups have both privileges (what they can do) and visibility (which assets they can see). User group visibility allows the group to access assets in an Asset Group, or a Model or Region.


How do solutions take advantage of this?


Dataitems can be configured to store no data, current value, or history. History is needed if you want to see the temperature plot over the last day. Many times, current value is all that's needed to process rules and see the state of an asset. The option not to store a dataitem makes sense if the dataitem is only used to run a rule, or if it will just be sent to another application. An agent can send a dataitem string to the server, and the server puts the string on the Message Queue to deliver to another application. In a pass-through mode, the dataitem doesn't need to be stored at all. A similar situation is if a string dataitem is parsed by the rule calling a Groovy script. The script can parse the string (which may be XML or part of a log file) and use the SDK to do some action.


Alarms are almost always used to notify people that they should do something. Alarms in Axeda have a lifecycle that corresponds to how people interact with them. An alarm begins its life when it's created. From that point, the alarm can be

  • Acknowledged – this means that someone has seen it
  • Escalated – the alarm condition hasn't been fixed for some time
  • Closed – the end of the Alarm's life
  • Suppressed – the alarm is logged in the history, but users don't see it. Set an alarm to suppressed when its just an annoyance and doesn't have any action required.
  • Disabled – occurrences of this alarm are thrown away. Rules don't even see them.

The Suppressed and Disabled modes are applied to an alarm of a given name, because they affect all future alarms by that name.

Files are uploaded for a few reasons. Log files are typically uploaded so a service tech can diagnose a problem. Data files can be uploaded so a script or external system can process the file and take appropriate action. This can be another way of sending information that doesn't fit in a dataitem. The configuration of an asset – both hardware and software – is called Inventory, and the inventory of assets is important in diagnostics, planning spare parts, knowing what patch to apply, and many more.

Extended Objects are attributes that can be added to the objects described here, or can be complete objects that live on their own. Your application can read and write these objects or attributes, and query them. The use is up to you.

Resources

You can find more information on the architecture of the platform in the Introduction to the Axeda Platform.

The Platform SDK and Web Services expose most of these objects for configuration as well as runtime. That means an application can provision models and assets, create the rules and apply them to models, then monitor the behavior of assets, all through Web Services.

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Last update:
‎May 24, 2016 08:02 PM
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