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Connect an OPCUA Device

As a Kubernetes native open source IoT development framework, Shifu integrates with the OPC UA protocol. Developers do not need to think about the actual connecting process of the protocol, but only need to set the key parameters of the protocol to establish a connection and monitor or control the operation of the device.

OPC UA Introduction

OPC UA (OPC Unified Architecture) is the OPC Foundation's machine-to-machine network transport protocol for automation technology. The OPC UA protocol supports two communication protocols: a binary communication protocol (opc.tcp://Server) and a web service communication protocol (http://Server), where the binary communication protocol is the most efficient and provides strong interoperability. firewall is opened.

The following section describes how to use Shifu to connect devices via the OPC UA protocol.

Set Up Shifu Configuration File​

Configure the IP Information of the Device​

Edit the examples/opcuaDeviceShifu/opcua_deploy/opcua_edgedevice.yaml file and change address to the IP address of the device:

address: opc.tcp://192.168.14.163:4840/freeopcua/server

Configure the OPCUA Connection Device Authentication​

Anonymous Mode​

Change AuthenticationMode to Anonymous:

AuthenticationMode: Anonymous

User Password Mode​

For user password mode, you need to modify AuthenticationMode, Username, Password under opcua_edgedevice.yaml file:

AuthenticationMode: UserName 
Username: user1  
Password: pwd1
use secret to store password

Create a Secret with opcua_password field filled by your password, and it will overwrite the opcua_edgedevice.yaml.

kubectl create secret generic deviceshifu-secret --from-literal=opcua_password=your_password -n deviceshifu

Certification Mode​

First you need to create Configmap for the certificate and private key.

$ kubectl create configmap edgedevice-opcua-certificate --from-file=your_certificate_file.pem --from-file=your_private_key.pem -n deviceshifu

Modify AuthenticationMode, CertificateFileName, PrivateKeyFileName under opcua_edgedevice.yaml file:

CertificateFileName: cert.pem  
PrivateKeyFileName: key.pem  
AuthenticationMode: Certificate

Start Shifu's OPCUA Components​

Start deviceshifu-opcua:

$ kubectl apply -f examples/opcuaDeviceShifu/opcua_deploy
configmap/opcua-configmap-0.0.1 created
deployment.apps/deviceshifu-opcua-deployment created
service/deviceshifu-opcua created
edgedevice.shifu.edgenesis.io/edgedevice-opcua created

The kubectl command allows you to view the status of deviceShifu:

$ kubectl get pods -n deviceshifu
deviceshifu-opcua-deployment-765b77cfcf-f7swc 1/1 Running 0 63s

Running Results​

Load nginx:1.21 to the Kubernetes cluster:

$ kubectl run nginx --image=nginx:1.21 -n deviceshifu

View nginx running status through kubectl:

$ kubectl get pods -n deviceshifu | grep nginx
nginx 1/1 Running 0 3m43s

Go to pod of nginx':

$ kubectl exec -it nginx -n deviceshifu -- bash

Issue an HTTP request to deviceShifu to get the data:

$ curl http://deviceshifu-opcua/get_value
25