The framework is an outcome of the Model-driven Design of Self-observing Products subproject.

The D’PUIS framework serves as a basis for dynamic product observation. This process is an iterative chain of specification, setup, data collection, data processing, analysis, reflection and, again, specification and so on, until the right data is acquired. While specification, analysis and reflection are tasks that have to be performed by (human) specialists, the remaining tasks can be automated to a high degree. This ensures fast feedback of relevant, meaningful data to the people who actually need the information and who can specify what they want to get out of the black boxes.

The DPUIS framework is basically a client-server architecture consisting of three layers:

• Authoring and analysis layer which provides also means to analyze the collected data
• Middleware layer which hosts observation specifications and collects data from product-integrated blackboxes
• Observation layer which is dedicated to the components which collected the actual data within the machines

The figure below shows the update mechanism, wherein observation specifications “designed” in the authoring environment, are published to the server and subsequently are sent to the component in the product instances. As soon as the new specifications are received by a component, they are parsed and new observation logic is configured on the machines. From then on, different data is collected according to the newly installed specifications.

When a certain amount of data is collected locally, a connection to the middleware layer is established and cached data is sent to the server. The next figure shows this procedure: the server aggregates data and provides access for analysis which can be carried out in terms of a real-time visualization, but also by external tools. Note that access to the valuable data is protected and the middleware might also serve as an anonymisation proxy, which ensures that data cannot be traced back to single machines.

A short example how to created observation specifications in the authoring environment can found here.

This page is intended to show the more technical internal parts of the D’PUIS framework. As this is on-going research, this part of the Soft Reliability wiki will change from time to time.

The glossary can be found here, however it is not available for public access since it is work in progress.