Source: Global IoT Observation
IoT Think Tank Edited and Published
Reprint must indicate the source and origin
—— [Guide] ——
The gateway is a product born to convert between different protocols, responsible for protocol conversion of various devices within the entire smart home system, and externally realizes remote communication through Ethernet or WiFi.
In the Internet, a gateway is an intermediate device that connects an internal network to other networks on the Internet, also known as a “router”. In the architecture of the Internet of Things, an intermediate device is needed between the perception layer and the network layer, which is the “IoT gateway”.
IoT Architecture
1. What is an IoT Gateway?
The gateway is a product born to convert between different protocols, responsible for protocol conversion of various devices within the entire smart home system, and externally realizes remote communication through Ethernet or WiFi.
Compared with the Internet era, the communication protocols of the Internet of Things are more diverse, and the fragmentation of objects is very serious. The importance of the gateway is thus highlighted—the IoT gateway can integrate the information collected from different objects and transmit it to the next level, enabling information to be transmitted between various parts. The IoT gateway can realize protocol conversion between perception networks and communication networks, as well as between different types of perception networks; it can achieve wide-area interconnection as well as local interconnection.
For example, home appliances such as TVs, washing machines, air conditioners, refrigerators; security devices such as access control, smoke detectors, cameras; lighting devices such as table lamps, chandeliers, electric curtains, etc., constitute their own self-organizing network subsystems through specific communication modules. Inside the home IoT gateway device, several commonly used self-organizing network communication protocols are integrated, allowing simultaneous communication with devices or subsystems using different protocols. Users only need to operate the gateway to control all smart devices connected to the gateway.
The gateway plays a very important core role in the system. What are the different forms of gateways?
Here we briefly discuss:
Wireless to Wireless: WiFi to 433MHz, Infrared, ZigBee (common in households)
GPRS (2G, 3G, 4G) to 433MHz, Infrared, ZigBee (common in industry)
Wireless to Wired: WiFi to RS485, RS232, CAN (mostly industrial)
Wired to Wireless: Ethernet to 433MHz, Infrared, ZigBee (common in households)
Wired to Wired: Ethernet to RS485, RS232, CAN (mostly industrial)
2. The History of IoT Gateways
The collection, transmission, and monitoring of device data are key steps in the entire process. With the continuous update of market demand and technological advancement, the IoT smart gateway has emerged. To better understand its value and the opportunity for its emergence, we must talk about the development process of data collection, transmission, and monitoring of device machines.
In the early stages of development, the awareness of data collection just emerged. Due to the lack of sensors and the backwardness of transmission technology, most data was measured manually. The drawbacks of manual measurement are self-evident; it is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and the detectable range is very narrow, so the manual measurement method was quickly eliminated.
1. Initial Local Monitoring, the First Attempt at Data Collection
True data monitoring should start from local monitoring. By connecting the device’s master control and PLC or HMI through a wired network, local human-machine interaction and information exchange can be conducted, and the data on the device is directly displayed on the PC or HMI.
The PC needs to be installed close to the device, and personnel need to monitor and provide feedback 24 hours a day. At this time, manual efforts still dominate, and the actual significance of local monitoring is minimal, remaining at simple data statistics.
2. The Emergence of Ethernet, Extending Physical Transmission Distance
Due to the limitations of local monitoring, people began to apply wired broadband technologies such as Ethernet in data collection and transmission, extending the range of data transmission. When device nodes connect to sensors, the data is transmitted through certain conversions to Ethernet and then to terminal displays. In terms of transmission range, there has been some expansion based on the original range.
However, the differences in protocol standards in between lead to communication not being smooth, and the inherent limitation of wired networks is that remote monitoring is not possible, which again presents a huge demand for the data market.
3. The Emergence of Gateways, Adapting to More Protocol Standards
With the emergence of 2G/3G/4G networks, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and other wireless transmission technologies, the issue of remote data transmission saw a turning point. However, the multiple protocol standards of various communication protocols hindered the “dialogue” between devices. At this time, the emergence of gateways was very timely, as gateways act as translators between communication protocols and data. Unlike bridges that simply convey information, gateways repackage the received information to meet system requirements.
The conversion capability of gateways, combined with wireless communication protocol technology, greatly extends the distance of the Internet of Things. However, IoT technology also faces some unique challenges. One challenge is that due to system memory, data storage capacity, and computing power limitations, many IoT nodes cannot directly connect to IP-based networks, making it difficult to achieve full interconnectivity. The IoT gateway can fill this gap, bridging the network between IP-based public networks and local IoT, using different communication protocols, data formats, or languages, even when the architectures are completely different.
In simple terms, with gateways, the so-called M2M is no longer a narrow definition of machine-to-machine dialogue, but rather seamless communication between devices, systems, and people.
4. Modern IoT Smart Gateways, Promoting Predictive Maintenance of Devices
Modern IoT smart gateways play a very important role in the IoT era. They are not only the link connecting perception networks and traditional communication networks. As gateway devices, IoT smart gateways can realize protocol conversion between perception networks and communication networks, as well as between different types of perception networks, achieving both wide-area and local interconnection. Additionally, IoT smart gateways need to have device management capabilities. Operators can manage the underlying perception nodes through IoT smart gateways, understand relevant information about each node, and achieve remote control. The unique edge computing capabilities of IoT allow traditional factories to achieve faster and more accurate data collection and transmission during digital transformation.
Currently, some companies in China, such as Huawei and Ruff, have produced edge computing gateways and IoT smart gateways, which have had multiple successful practices in real production environments, helping clients quickly and efficiently connect devices, collect and transmit data, and provide nearby edge intelligence services through their own edge computing capabilities, meeting the key needs of industry digitization in terms of agile connectivity, real-time business, data optimization, application intelligence, security, and privacy protection. Reducing labor costs, equipment maintenance costs, and time costs is very valuable, and this will also be one of the core competitive advantages for many small and medium-sized factories in the industrial 4.0 transformation battle.
Of course, the technical capabilities of gateways have not yet reached their endpoint. As market demand continues to rise and IoT technology continues to improve, it is believed that more comprehensive IoT gateways will continue to emerge, providing better services for the future development of IoT.
3. The Role of IoT Gateways
Now that you know what a gateway is, you may wonder what the benefits are of taking extra steps between sensors/devices and the cloud.
Battery Life
If sensors/devices are located in remote areas, remote connections may be needed, such as satellite connections, to communicate with the cloud. As mentioned here, longer ranges usually mean increased power consumption (and costs); this can be a problem for small sensors/devices with limited battery life.
If sensors can last for years instead of months or weeks. By using an elevated gateway installed near the periphery or the top of a barn, the sensors/devices only need to send data over a short distance to the gateway, and the gateway can send the data back to the cloud via a single higher bandwidth connection.
Gateways allow sensors/devices to communicate over shorter distances, thus improving battery life.
Conversion of Different Protocols
A complete IoT application may involve many different types of sensors and devices. Again, using smart agriculture, you may need sensors for temperature, humidity, and sunlight, as well as devices for automatic irrigation and fertilizer systems.
All of these different sensors and devices may use different transmission protocols (basically the rules and formats for transmitting information). Protocols include LPWAN, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Zigbee, etc.
Gateways can communicate with sensors/devices using different protocols and then convert that data into standard protocols (like MQTT) for sending to the cloud.
Unfiltered Data
Sometimes, sensors/devices can generate so much data that it overwhelms the system or makes transmission and storage costs extremely high. Typically, in such cases, only a small fraction of the data is actually valuable. For example, security cameras do not need to send video data of empty hallways.
Gateways can preprocess and filter the data generated by sensors/devices to reduce transmission, processing, and storage requirements.
High Latency
Time can be critical for certain IoT applications; sensors/devices cannot transmit data to the cloud and wait for a response before taking action. This is particularly true in life-or-death situations in the medical field or for fast-moving objects like cars.
By processing data on the gateway and issuing commands locally, higher latency can be avoided. However, many sensors/devices in IoT applications are too small and have too low battery life to perform processing.
Gateways can reduce latency for time-critical applications by performing processing on the gateway itself rather than in the cloud.
Security
Every sensor/device connected to the Internet is vulnerable to hacking. Compromised sensors/devices are bad news. Not just for the owners, but for everyone.
A few weeks ago, a piece of malware called Mirai was used to attack and control thousands of IoT devices. Then, this “botnet” of devices was used to occupy a significant portion of the Internet (more on Mirai).
Gateways reduce the number of sensors/devices connected to the Internet because sensors/devices only connect to the gateway. However, this makes the gateway itself a target and the first line of defense. That is why security must be a priority for any gateway.
Conclusion
In the future IoT era, IoT gateways will play a very important role, becoming the link between perception networks and traditional communication networks.
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