OSGi Community Event 2016 Presentation by Tim Ward (Paremus) The Internet of Things is a hot topic in the IT industry, and it shows no sign of cooling down. When OSGi was first conceived its purpose was to do exactly the sorts of things that IoT gateways do right now. In fact a lot of IoT gateways run OSGi today! The OSGi IoT Expert Group exists to help identify new areas where OSGi can offer a better IoT platform, and to define solutions for those use cases. This talk from the chair of the IoT Expert Group will cover the recent work that’s been going on in the IoT Expert Group, what outputs you can expect to see in the future, and also information about how you can get involved with the Expert Group Background The OSGi service platform has existed as a modular micro-service runtime for well over a decade, and it was originally created to run on small embedded systems in the home. It turns out that the same model works very well on servers and in the cloud, making OSGi the perfect platform for end-to-end IoT development. In the last two years the OSGi Alliance have been on an IoT requirements gathering mission, the result of which has been the new IoT Expert Group. Whether you’re looking for security test suites, low-footprint communications with edge devices, or large-scale data streaming the IoT Expert Group are there to make sure that the experience is as smooth and simple as possible.

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May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
OSGi Community Event 2016
co-located at
EclipseCon Europe 2016
OSGi Community Event 2016
What’s happening in the IoT Expert Group?
Tim Ward
http://www.paremus.com
info@paremus.com

2. Copyright © 2005 - 2016 Paremus Ltd.
May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
•Chief Technology Officer at Paremus
•8 years developing OSGi specifications
•Co-Chair of the OSGi IoT Expert Group
•Interested in Asynchronous Distributed Systems
•Author of Manning’s Enterprise OSGi in Action
•http://www.manning.com/cummins
Who is Tim Ward?
@TimothyWard

3. Copyright © 2005 - 2016 Paremus Ltd.
May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
OSGi - More than just a module
Framework

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May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
OSGi and IoT - I thought OSGi was a module framework?
•Yes, OSGi does provide a module framework
•No that is not all that the OSGi Alliance does!
•Certification exams - (there was one on Monday!)
•Additional specifications to offer new features to OSGi applications
•Three “Expert Groups” gather domain specific requirements
•These eventually become OSGi specifications

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May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
Why is OSGi good for IoT?
IoT “things” are usually too constrained to run Java, but most gateways do
OSGi was originally designed to run on residential gateways!
OSGi has also proven to be a great server platform
Having the same platform in the cloud and on the edge reduces impedance
OSGi is dynamic and remotely manageable by design
Edge servers must be easy to update
“Things” may come and go, or move, or break at any time

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
Why is OSGi good for IoT (2)?
OSGi’s dynamic behaviour is vitally important
Well designed OSGi systems will “self-heal” by dynamically re-wiring
OSGi services are a perfect model for the vagaries of “things”
In a server room losing a machine is bad, and a whole rack catastrophic
In IoT losing “a whole rack” is normal!
I take off my watch/leave my house/reboot my router/run out of battery…
OSGi is designed to cope with regular, sustained catastrophic failure
And then to start working again afterwards!

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
The OSGi IoT Expert Group
•The IoT Expert group is the newest in the OSGi alliance
•It focusses on requirements that are relevant to IoT applications
•The IoT Expert Group provides a “common ground” for requirements that
straddled the existing Enterprise and Residential Expert Groups
•Existing OSGi specifications and technology will be reused where possible
•New requirements will be incorporated into new specifications/updates

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
What does an Expert Group actually do?

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
The OSGi specification process
OSGi specifications are written based on need
Everything starts with a requirement!
Related requirements are gathered together,
These are turned into an RFP document
RFP documents are published to GitHub
Publicly readable, but only members may write/update
When ready, RFP documents are put to a vote
Accepted RFPs are eligible for the next phase

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
The OSGi specification process (2)
Once the RFC is ready then there is another vote!
An accepted RFP will then be turned into an RFC document
An RFC proposes solutions to the RFP requirements
RFCs are discussed and debated (just like RFPs)
Sometimes a number of iterations are needed
to come up with the “right” solution

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
The OSGi specification process (3)
The specification is only complete once all three pieces are ready!
Then there is a final vote
The RFC document is used to write a specification chapter
The specification chapter is used to produce both
a reference implementation and compliance tests
Typically the authors of these are different
people (usually from different companies)

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
The Specification release
Once new chapters are “ready” a new release will be created
Typically releases happen every 18-24 months
The process may seem complicated, but it ensures quality
The “three legged stool” of specification, RI and CT is required
Each of the pieces tests that the others are correct!
Another important factor is that the specification is iteratively improved
Make it as simple as possible but no simpler

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
Current IoT EG Activities

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
IoT Security Guidelines (RFP 176)
An important aspect of IoT is security
How do I know that the bundle I’m installing is safe
OSGi has permissions and code signing, but what about mistakes?
This RFP has resulted in:
A White Paper (undergoing final reviews)
A Security Test suite for local and remote framework testing

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
IoT Security Test Suite
The IoT Security Test suite is publicly available and Open Source
https://github.com/osgi/osgi.security-tests
It uses JUnit 4 tests to verify security recommendations
These tests can be run using Gradle, or from Bndtools
A JUnit runner and test probe provide support for testing remote devices
For Example…

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
RFC 229 — MQTT communications
MQTT is a popular lightweight communications mechanism for IoT devices
A broker-based system for message queuing and delivery
MQTT messages are used for bi-directional communication with Things
Data feeds from sensors
Control messages for reconfiguration, or changing the state of actuators
Implementation based on ideas and experience from the OSGi Train!

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
RFP 185 — Smart Device Templates
OSGi is a popular platform for residential gateways
A huge variety of smart devices exist already
Devices are heterogeneous, both in protocol and API
This RFP gathers requirements for providing and consuming metadata
HGI/OneM2M Smart Device Templates
IoTivity RAML definitions
…

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
RFP Futures
CoAP - A lightweight communications protocol with built-in API discovery
RFID - A mechanism for reading from and controlling RFID detectors
Frequency and vendor independent
OneM2M collaborations - interoperation with OneM2M specifications
Continuation of OSGi as a reference platform for OneM2M

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
Getting involved

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OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
How do I get involved?
•Submitting requirements to an Expert Group can be done by anyone!
•Add your own using OSGi’s public bugzilla - https://osgi.org/bugzilla/
•Follow the Expert Group’s work on GitHub!
•All RFP/RFC work is publicly available - https://github.com/osgi/design
•Participating in an OSGi Expert Group does require membership
•The lowest level membership is enough to contribute to specifications
•Members often participate in multiple Expert Groups

21. Copyright © 2005 - 2016 Paremus Ltd.
May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016

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May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
•For more about OSGi...
• Specifications: http://www.osgi.org
• RFPs/RFCs: https://github.com/osgi/design
• OSGi Security Tests: https://github.com/osgi/osgi.security-tests
• Enterprise OSGi in Action
• http://www.manning.com/cummins
•Icons from http://www.toicon.com/
• Sharp Corners series by Shannon Thomas
Questions?
Thanks!
http://www.paremus.com
info@paremus.com
http://www.manning.com/cummins/

23. Copyright © 2005 - 2016 Paremus Ltd.
May not be reproduced by any means without express permission. All rights reserved.
OSGi Community Event Nov 2016
www.paremus.com @Paremus info@paremus.com