In earlier chapters, we described the growing trend of computing activities taking place in smart edge devices, thus enabling immediate actions to take place prior to the transmission of data to the backend infrastructure. Some are now referring to this paradigm as fog computing. As this book was being published, consortia were in the initial stages of defining fog computing reference architectures and establishing standards through standards bodies.
Edge devices themselves are becoming smaller and consolidating. Previously, the controllers, HMIs, cameras, motion controls, and SCADA devices were physically separated and then networked together in field locations. Increasingly, these components reside in single units that also contain ever more powerful processors and field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) for customization.
The edge devices are sometimes...
