Client: RedHat
Format: Whitepaper
Size: 450 KB
Language: English
Date: 29.04.2025
SYSTEM ORCHESTRATION FOR OPEN INDUSTRIAL AUTOMATION
The Open Process Automation Forum (OPAF) recently announced its intention to base its System Orchestration O-PAS specification on the OASIS TOSCA standard. In the context of open heterogeneous industrial automation systems, the term “System Orchestration” has a very broad meaning. It includes automated configuration, deployment, coordination, integration, and management of distributed systems and services. System Orchestration is essential for successfully managing complex software environments in modern, cloud-native application architectures. As industrial automation adopts these same architectures, it will also become critical for the industrial automation systems of the future.
In the industrial automation area, leading end users and suppliers are now beginning to employ commercial orchestration software tools within some products and in open automation test beds and trial applications. At the 2024 ARC Forum, both end users and suppliers reported huge potential value and improvement from the effective use of such tools in industrial automation settings.
Over the last 20 years in the IT and cloud computing space, many software tools have been developed and commercialized to serve these types of functions. These tools originated in open source, and several are now supported by commercial suppliers. Some have large installed bases in major enterprises. They also have large and active end-user communities. They do not comply with a single standard, but rather support distinct Domain Specific Languages (DSL). During the same period, the vendor-neutral TOSCA specification has been employed in academic research and reportedly in some proprietary software in the telecom industry, but has had a negligible impact in commercial markets.
In the industrial automation area, leading end users and suppliers are now beginning to employ commercial orchestration software tools within some products and in open automation test beds and trial applications. At the 2024 ARC Forum, both end users and suppliers reported huge potential value and improvement from the effective use of such tools in industrial automation settings.
Over the last 20 years in the IT and cloud computing space, many software tools have been developed and commercialized to serve these types of functions. These tools originated in open source, and several are now supported by commercial suppliers. Some have large installed bases in major enterprises. They also have large and active end-user communities. They do not comply with a single standard, but rather support distinct Domain Specific Languages (DSL). During the same period, the vendor-neutral TOSCA specification has been employed in academic research and reportedly in some proprietary software in the telecom industry, but has had a negligible impact in commercial markets.
