Cloud Gateway for Legacy Hotel Systems
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Solution Overview
Problem
Legacy systems in the hotel industry, such as Property Management Systems, often lack internet connectivity and use proprietary protocols, making it difficult to integrate them with cloud services, and they are typically unsecured, posing challenges for seamless communication and data management.
Innovation Solution
A local cloud gateway with diverse interface connectors is introduced to physically connect legacy devices to the cloud, enabling protocol translation, secure communication, and logical representation of devices, along with user-friendly configuration and actuator control, allowing seamless integration and management of these devices with cloud services.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If legacy systems are directly connected to cloud services, then integration complexity is reduced, but compatibility and security issues arise due to proprietary protocols and lack of internet connectivity capability
Solution Approach 1:
A cloud gateway device is introduced as an intermediary between legacy systems and cloud services. The gateway includes protocol translators that convert proprietary legacy protocols into standard TCP/IP protocols, enabling communication without requiring changes to the legacy systems themselves. This mediator approach resolves the contradiction by maintaining legacy system integrity while achieving cloud integration.
Solution Approach 2:
The integration architecture is segmented into distinct functional components: legacy systems, cloud gateway (with protocol translators and virtualization layers), and cloud services. This segmentation allows each component to operate independently with its own protocol stack, solving the compatibility issue while keeping overall integration manageable.
2Reliability
If legacy systems are secured with encryption and authentication, then data security is improved, but performance and complexity increase due to processing overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The cloud gateway acts as a security intermediary, implementing encryption and authentication mechanisms between legacy systems and cloud services. Rather than securing legacy systems directly, the gateway handles security protocols, translating secure cloud communications into unsecured legacy system communications and vice versa, thereby protecting data without modifying legacy systems.
3Adaptability or versatility
If cloud gateway implements comprehensive protocol translation, then compatibility with legacy systems is improved, but processing overhead and latency increase
Solution Approach 1:
Protocol translation rules and mappings are pre-configured and cached in the cloud gateway before actual communication occurs. Frequently used protocol translations are prepared in advance, reducing real-time processing requirements and minimizing latency during actual data transmission between legacy systems and cloud services.
Data Source
AI summary
The document describes systems and methods for handling local (legacy) devices. A local cloud gateway comprises a plurality of interface connectors of different types to physically connect a plurality of these legacy devices to the cloud, comprising a plurality of distant servers. Developments describe the step of extracting the functional messages out of messages stemming from local legacy devices (e.g. protocol translators), secure communications, logical representations of legacy devices in the cloud (“twins”), administration options, various user interfaces (e.g. buzzer) for seamless configuration and use, the use of one or more actuators (retroactions on the physical world), etc. Software and/or hardware embodiments are described.