OASIS oBIX technical committee formed to advance Web services standard

Engineered Systems, August, 2004

International standards consortium Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) announced plans to advance oBIX (open building information exchange), a Web services implementation for the building management and controls industry. The new OASIS oBIX technical committee will define a standard method to enable mechanical and electrical systems in facilities and buildings to communicate with enterprise applications, oBIX is an example of the growing trend of vertical industries organizing within OASIS to develop standards that leverage Web services methods for their specific industry needs.

oBIX will be applicable to a wide variety of smart systems embedded in facilities, such as HVAC, elevators, laboratory equipment, life/safety systems, access control, intruder detection, audio visual event management, closed circuit television monitoring, and many others, oBIX will also provide access to information from sensing devices that are not typically part of control systems, delivering real-time access to sensors that measure or monitor the physical space in a facility, including environmental sensing, electrical panels, and power meters.

"oBIX will improve operational effectiveness, giving facility managers and building owners increased knowledge and control of their properties. It will be a major step forward in fulfilling the vision of truly intelligent buildings," said Toby Considine of the University of North Carolina, proposed chair of the OASIS oBIX Technical Committee.

The OASIS oBIX Technical Committee is made up of users and vendors from all sectors of the building controls market, including the security, HVAC, building automation, open protocol, and IT disciplines. Current members are listed at www.oasis-open.org/, however, participation remains open to all organizations and individuals. OASIS also offers a mechanism for public comment on the work.

"We intend to work with control protocols such as LonTalk (now known as ANSI/EIA/CEA709.1) and BACnet (ASHRAE/ANSI 135-2001, ISO 16484-5) so that oBIX can become the vehicle to take building systems to the TCP/IP layer in a consistent manner for the benefit of the enterprise, oBIX will also make it possible to integrate the maW legacy proprietary control and monitoring systems in use today as well as future, native TCP/IP control systems," said Paul Ehrlich of Tranc, convener of the OASIS oBIX Technical Committee.