Dynamic Protocol Installation in Building Automation Gateways
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Solution Overview
Problem
Building automation devices face compatibility issues due to the variety of wireless communication protocols, requiring extensive and costly maintenance to support all current and future protocols in network managers.
Innovation Solution
A gateway with transceivers and antennas that receives packets from building automation devices, determines unsupported protocols, and installs executable software from a protocol server to enable communication over compatible protocols like 6LoWPAN, ZigBee, or Bluetooth, allowing dynamic protocol support without pre-installing all possible protocols.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If the gateway pre-installs all possible wireless communication protocols to support all building automation devices, then communication compatibility is improved, but device complexity and maintenance costs increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The gateway dynamically loads and unloads protocol software modules based on actual communication needs. Instead of having all protocols permanently installed, the system activates only the required protocols when specific building automation devices need to communicate, reducing overall complexity while maintaining versatility.
Solution Approach 2:
The gateway performs preliminary inspection of incoming packets to identify the communication protocol being used. By detecting the protocol type first (through packet inspection), the gateway can then selectively load the appropriate protocol module, avoiding the need to pre-install all possible protocols.
2Adaptability or versatility
If the gateway supports multiple wireless communication protocols simultaneously, then communication versatility is improved, but maintenance time and costs increase
Solution Approach 1:
The protocol support functionality is segmented into independent, modular software components. Each wireless communication protocol (Zigbee, Bluetooth, 6LoWPAN, etc.) is implemented as a separate loadable module that can be independently managed, updated, and removed without affecting other protocols or the core gateway functionality.
Solution Approach 2:
The gateway discards (unloads) protocol modules that are not currently needed and recovers (loads) them only when required for communication. This on-demand approach allows the system to maintain multiple protocol capabilities over time while minimizing the number of protocols actively running, thereby reducing maintenance burden.
3Adaptability or versatility
If the gateway inspects packets to determine unsupported protocols and dynamically installs software, then adaptability is improved, but processing time increases
Solution Approach 1:
The gateway performs partial inspection of packets - examining only the necessary header fields or signature bytes required to identify the communication protocol type. This partial action is sufficient to determine the required protocol module without performing exhaustive analysis of the entire packet content, thus minimizing processing time overhead.
Data Source
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AI summary
It is presented a method for managing communication with a building automation device. The method is performed in a gateway and comprises the steps of: receiving a packet from the building automation device; determining that the gateway currently fails to support a communication protocol being compatible with the packet; transmitting the packet to a protocol server; receiving, from the protocol server, executable software instructions to be used for communication over a communication protocol being compatible with the packet; and installing the executable software instructions to provide a capability to communicate over the communication protocol being compatible with the packet.