ENVIRONMENT FOR DESIGNING AND SIMULATING

CONTROL NETWORKS AT DIGITAL HOME

Jorge Azorín-López, Rafael J. Valdivieso-Sarabia, Andrés Fuster-Guilló

and Juan M. García-Chamizo

Dpto. Tecnología Informática y Computación, University of Alicante, Ctra. San Vicente del Raspeig s/n, Alicante, Spain

Keywords: Simulation, control network design, automation, digital home.

Abstract: A design and simulation environment for control network is presented. Control network design could be

complex task because many technologies are involved. Each network technology uses its own design and

configuration software. Also, it is necessary realize network installation in order to validate its correct

operation. This situation introduces high temporal and economical costs in the network life cycle.

Simulation design methodology as a task allows detect errors prematurely. System validations are made to a

high level of abstraction. This paper proposes a design and simulation environment of digital home control

network. It is based on a design independent from technology and postpone the technology choice and

incorporates a simulation task that allows simulate the network.

1 INTRODUCTION

In this paper a digital home control networks design

environment is proposed. The set of technologies

that make the applications viable are diverse: X10

(Fuster and Azorín, 2005), KNX/EIB (Haenselmann

et al., 2007), LonWorks (Ming et al., 2007), CAN

(Jung et al., 2005), for example. It turns out complex

to integrate them in a common system. However,

sometimes system requirements need to

communicate them in order to provide higher

services. Discovery protocols facilitate devices

connection and the services negotiation like:

Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) (Rhee et al., 2004),

Jini Network Technology, Open Service Gateway

initiative (OSGi) (Kawamura and Maeomichi,

2004). In spite of standardization attempt, the

integration is complex. As example, tools used by

technologies considered as automation networks

standard are: European Installation Bus Tool

Software (ETS) for Konnex (KNX), and LonMaker

Integration Tool (LonMaker) for Lonworks. Both

tools have the same purpose, but they have different

design methodology. Moreover these tools do not

allow realizing simulations. A consequence is that

the correct functioning will not be verified until the

system will be implemented. These facts introduce

high temporal and economical costs. Simulation

brings advantages in the design of control

installation. It allows detect errors prematurely in the

design phase (Denning et al., 1989). Therefore

simulation is seen as a test case (Norton and

Suppe,

2001), where checks are made to a higher level of

abstraction. There are some control network

simulators like DOMOSIM (Bravo et al., 2006) and

VISIR (González et al. 2001) that are orientated to

teaching methodology of facilities design. These

tools present negative aspects like: are oriented to

one technology or are not valid for professional

environment.

The proposal gathered in this paper is to provide

an environment to provide control network

architectures in the digital home. The objective is

that these architectures can be valid for any

technology. We are going to pay special attention to

network simulation task.

2 MODELING CONTROL

SYSTEMS

The technologies and methods used for modelling

home automated systems are based on the use of

very low level technologies (Muñoz et al., 2004).

The great diversity of control technologies causes

175

Azorín-López J., J. Valdivieso-Sarabia R., Fuster-Guilló A. and M. García-Chamizo J. (2008).

ENVIRONMENT FOR DESIGNING AND SIMULATING CONTROL NETWORKS AT DIGITAL HOME.

In Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Informatics in Control, Automation and Robotics - RA, pages 175-178

DOI: 10.5220/0001498901750178

 SciTePress

that the system creation, following bottom-up

methodologies turns out to be a complex task.

The top-down methodologies are characterized

essentially abstract. They require that design

network is conceived before any consideration

imposed by the technologies. A model based on

Model Driven Architecture (MDA) (Mellor et al.,

2004) and Services Oriented Architectures (SOA)

(Newcomer and Lomow, 2005) is proposed. It

consists in three layers called: functional, structural

and technological. Each layer is defined by the

corresponding question:

What features I want to offer (functional). The

design will provide features, and will be composed

by a set of services.

How should behave services (structural). How

relate them to provide the features.

What technologies will implement the system

(technological). The implementation technology will

be chosen among the available technologies.

Functional is the most abstraction layer. It

describes installation features. It avoids thinking

about how to do this and technology

implementation. In this layer, the control

installation, CI, is defined by a set of services, Si,

(1). Services, Si, need to satisfy a set of tasks, ti (2).

}{

SSSCI ,...,,

(1)

}{

iniii

tttS ,...,,

(2)

The next level of abstraction is called structural.

It is focuses on the structure and generic devices

behaviour. Since the structural layer, the control

installation, CI, is composed of a set of generic

resources, Rs, and a wide range of connections, C,

which are established between resources (3).

},...,,{

},,...,,{

/),(

CCCC

RsRsRsRs

CRsCICI

(3)

A resource represents the entity that provides

some tasks, tij. Resources are represented as a series

of tasks, tij, offered to other entities (4).

},...,,{

21 imiiii

tttRsRs =

(4)

Connections are seen as associations between

two resources, Rsi and Rso (5).

),(

oiii

RsRsCC =

(5)

Lower abstraction layer is technological. It is an

instance of structural layer using a specific

technology. Resources are defined by the set of

tasks, Ti, and by set of characteristics, CAi, (6).

},...,,{

/),(

ipiii

iiii

cacacaCA

CATRR

(6)

In order to design specific system implantation is

necessary to make the transition from the functional

to structural and finally, to technological. To achieve

the first transition, the services should have all their

tasks matched with some of the tasks that provide

the resources of the technological layer. Therefore

should there some task, txy, belong to any resource,

Rsx, which is equivalent to the task, tij, required for

service Si. This must be met for all tasks, tij,

required by the service, Si (7).

RsRsSttt

Rst

xiijijxy

xxy

∈∈∀≡

∈

∃

(7)

Structural technological transition needs to

match generic resources Rs, with technological

resources Ri. Therefore all tasks, txy, from all

generic resources, Rsx, should be matched with task,

tij, from technological resources Ri. This matching

must be among equivalent tasks, (8).

ijixxyjixy

RtRsttt

RRRsRs

∈∈∀≡

∈

∃

∈

∀

(8)

3 TRASGU: DESIGN

ENVIRONMENT

Trasgu is a design environment based on the

previously model defined. The installation is

designed from a higher level of abstraction and the

specific implementation aspects are chosen in last

steps. It provides robustness design and reduction of

development time, because transitions from the

highest abstraction level to the lowest are

progressive and simple.

Figure 1: Environment features and their possible users.

ICINCO 2008 - International Conference on Informatics in Control, Automation and Robotics

176

Environment provides the following features:

designing a control installation independently any

technology; perform simulations to verify and

validate that our design meets users specifications;

create architecture in agreement to the chosen

technology for implementation; making budgets

with each technology; develop different types of

reports. These features will be used by their

respective actors who are involved in a control

installation: designers, integrators, property

developers, engineer... (See figure 1).

The installation design is the first task. First of

all, services (2) should be added then input and

output resources (4) should be added and connected

with their corresponding services.

Network design is simulated in order to

guarantee that design satisfies specification. This

simulation will be explained in next points. The

architecture creation task allows architecture

generation that will implement the design in a real

installation. This architecture is based on a

middleware (Valdivieso et al., 2007) (Fuster et al.,

2005) that provides communication among different

control technologies. The budget creation task

generates budgets from the technological design.

The reports development task allows generate some

types of reports: wired connections, devices

situation, etc.

4 SIMULATION

The environment is designed to perform simulations

from different abstraction levels. Simulations are

from functional layer (1), (2), structural layer (3), (4)

and (5) and technological layer (6). The functional

simulation is responsible for simulating the

behaviour of generic control network. With this

validation the generic device configuration and

connections can be ensured. The structural

simulation includes the functional, but adds new

features, like the real resources position and

installation regulation. The technological simulation

determines the real behaviour that the implemented

control network provides.

Simulation calculations are realized by an

external module that has been developed in Matlab /

Simulink. The communication between the

simulation calculations module and environment has

been done through a Java library called jMatLink

(Müller and Waller, 1999). It is responsible for

sending commands to Matlab. A library called jSCA

has been developed. It is responsible for

encapsulating Matlab commands for facilitate the

communication. The jSCA features are implemented

as methods which allow: create Matlab instances;

create, configure, and remove blocks in Simulink;

configure parameters simulation, and obtain the

simulation results. This library is a level above

jMatLink. The environment calls jSCA library and

this library calls jMatlink library.

Figure 2: Architecture that achieves communication

among Java application and Simulink.

The architecture that achieves the

communication among Java application and

Simulink is showed at figure 2. The first layer is the

own Trasgu that communicates with jSCA library in

order to use jMatlink library that allows

communication with matlab engine. It is daemon

that is listening matlab commands thrown by

jMatlink and uses own Simulink library for simulate.

4.1 Implementation

The environment has been implemented in Java and

uses an information system implemented in XML.

These XML files reflect information of the resources

that can be used in the installation and the

information about the current network. This

information is reflected from abstraction layers

defined at the model.

Environment presents distinct areas. Services

that the user can add to the network are at the top of

the window. Generic resources are on the left side of

the window and can be used in the design. Building

plant is on the centre. Services and resources can be

added to this area. Services (2) define their

behaviour based on inputs from input resources (4)

and provide outputs to output resources (4). These

functions are logical, arithmetical and comparison

operators. This specification is done in a form that

contains inputs, output and operators that allows

interconnect them. Figure 3 shows control network

designed at environment.

Simulation requires a parallel model from the

functional layer in Simulink. This model is

equivalent to the XML files defined in the

information system used by the environment. Each

resource defined in the environment is corresponded

by another defined in Simulink library created for

control network simulation. The Simulink model

consists in a block set formed by input blocks,

output blocks, input-output blocks, and connections

in order to establish a logic circuit. For this purpose

ENVIRONMENT FOR DESIGNING AND SIMULATING CONTROL NETWORKS AT DIGITAL HOME

177

Figure 3: Network designed at environment.

there are two block types: discrete and continuous.

The discrete blocks are for digital devices, and

continuous are for analogic devices.

The simulation starts creating an equivalent

control network in Simulink. The corresponding

network blocks must be added to create the mdl file.

Parameters of each block are configured and

connections among blocks are created. The last step

is to add probability or schedules events for activate

sensors. Finally the mdl file is created and Simulink

executes the simulation and the environment reads

values from all Simulink network blocks and

represents them at environment.

5 CONCLUSIONS

This paper presents a design and simulation

environment of control networks in digital home.

The objective is to facilitate the tasks of designing

and validating control networks. A top-down

methodology is proposed, where technology

implementation choice is left to the end phase of

designing process. The environment kernel is the

control network model around different abstraction

layers: functional, structural and technological.

Simulation is presented as a new phase in

methodology of design control network. It reduces

costs and helps us to design effective and efficient

control networks.

The future work is aimed to deepening in aspects

of results generalization: new models for structural

and technological layers, simulation of technological

layer and interactive simulation module.

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