Internet of Things Architecture

Flexibility X X X X

Table 4 : Mapping of the high-level roles of the Management FG onto FCs.

IoT systems differ from pure networking solutions in that they also offer low-
level services and support for business administration. An IoT system is thus
much more complex than a communication system, and we chose to make the
management of FG-specific FCs part of that very FG, while the Management
FG is responsible for cross-functionality-group task. In other words, it is
responsible for the composition and tracking of actions that involve several of
the ―core FGs‖ (i.e. not including Device and Application FG). The requirement
grounding for the Management FG is based on the extrapolation of a number of
communications requirements to system-wide management and behaviours
(these requirements can be found in the description of the individual functional
components). In addition, if the interaction of the Application and/or Device FG
necessitates the composition and tracking of at least two core FGs, such
actions are also candidates for the sphere of responsibility of the Management
FG.

By exclusion, the following management activities are thus out of the scope of
the Management FG:

1. Activities that only pertain to a single functionality group: an example for
   this is the management of authorisations in the Security FG;


2. The management of interactions between functionality groups that do not
   require ―external‖ intervention. An example for the latter are requests
   between two FGs that can be managed by the requesting FG itself.

The Management FG (see Figure 39 ) consists of five Functional Components:

 Configuration;

 Fault;

 Reporting;

 Member;

 State.