© 2015 IBM Corporation

IAB-3948Wiring the Internet of Things with Node-RED

Peter Niblett

Shalini Kapoor

IBM Internet of Things Business Unit

Agenda

Brief introduction to the IoT and IBM Internet of Things Foundation

What is Node-RED?

Node-RED and the IOT

In a Device or Gateway

In Bluemix

Demonstration

Patterns of Use

Building the Internet of Things with IBM

Secureintelligence and action is critical from the thing up

through industry solutions

Analyze & Optimizeinformation from across the lifecycle, leveraging insight

for action

Connect, Collect and Storeinformation from a range of things with range of volume,

variety and velocity

Operateinfrastructure safely and securely from rollout to

production

Managethe lifecycle of things

ensuring safe, reliable and predictive operations

Industry-specific Solutions

Design & Engineer Operate Manage

Analyze and Optimize

Connect, Collect and Store

Se

cu

re

Products, Assets, Infrastructure

Protocols & Gateways

Design and Engineerthings and applications,

addressing requirements management and complex system design processes

Industry-specific Solutions

Design & Engineer

Operate Manage

Analyze and Optimize

IBM Internet of Things Foundation: What is it?

Products, Assets, Infrastructure

Protocols & Gateways

Se

cu

re

Connect, Collect and Store

A new offering within IBM’s Bluemix PaaS offering that allows Internet-

connected devices to be integrated directly into Bluemix solutions

Connect, Collect and Storeinformation from a range of things with range of volume,

variety and velocity

Internet of Things Infrastructure

In most IoT applications the predominant flow of data is between device to backend

In some applications there is communication between the devices themselves

Physical World

Wide Area Network

IoT

Gateways

Physical World

Sensor Network

IoT Service Platform

Smart

supply chain

Smart

grid

Smart

healthcare

Smart

buildingapp1 app2 app3

Cloud Provider

or Data Center

Home gateways, Mobile

Phones etc.

Back end Applications

and analytics. May have

mobile / web interfaces

Devices in the field. May

connect through

gateways (as shown) or

have direct connection to

the backend

Connect, Collect and Store

Building an IoT Solution

5

Connect, Collect, Store

Mobile Push

Sensors

Historian service

NoSQL, Relational, Timeseries & Spatial storage & analytics

Custom Application

Bluemix / Softlayer

BigInsights

Cloud infrastructure

Hadoop

Publish / Subscribe

MQTT protocol

Assemble

Wire

MQTT server

MQTT client

What is Node-RED?Why did we develop it?

Why did we develop Node-RED?

• Internet of Things solutions often require us to pull together

different device APIs and online services in new and interesting

ways.

• Time spent figuring out how to access a Serial port, or to

complete an OAuth flow against Twitter is time not spent on

creating the real value of a solution.

• We need tools that make it easier for developers at all levels to

bring together the different streams of events, both physical and

digital, that make up the Internet of Things.

It provides a browser-based UI for creating flows of events and deploying them to

the runtime.

Its light-weight runtime, built in node.js, is

ideal for edge-of-network environments

or running in Bluemix

It can be easily expanded by adding new

nodes to its palette – taking full advantage

of the node package manager (npm)

ecosystem

Node-RED makes it easy to wire together the IoT

Released on GitHub September 2013

Apache 2 License

3rd party pull-requests accepted under

Contributor License Agreement

Contributions having included nodes for:

• Twillio (sms capability)

• Postgres

• Amazon Dynamo

• Active Google Group and irc channel

http://nodered.org - main site

http://flows.nodered.org

–Recently launched online flow library

–Encourages sharing and reuse of flows

within the community

Open Source Development

Component parts

10

node.js runtime

Node-RED runtime

Node-RED editor (UI)

Flow store

Browser-based editor. Lets

you create flows and deploy

them to the runtime

User-written flow

Nodes• Standard node-RED nodes

• Third-party contributions

• User-written

Executes a single flow. It is a

node.js application

Event-driven JavaScript

runtime. Runs in Bluemix or

standalone (e.g in a device)

Node-RED Flows and Nodes

11

Input node: reads

events from IoTF Debug node: writes

output to debug window

These wires are attached to the same

terminal, so output from “IoT App in” is

copied to both receiving nodes

Switch node: routes incoming

messages to one or more of its

output terminals

Node-RED implements a graphical Data Flow language.

Flows can be imported or exported as JSON objects

JSON version of the flow on the previous slide

12

[{"id":"3dee4a0b.a71e36","type":"ibmiot in","inputType":"evt","deviceType":"+","format":"json","name":"IBM IoT

App In","service":"quickstart","x":157,"y":269,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18",

"wires":[["90dd0f60.b08ee8","e344143.da0b3e8"]]},

{"id":"90dd0f60.b08ee8","type":"function","name":"temp","func":"return {payload:msg.payload.d.temp};",

"outputs":1,"x":330.5,"y":315,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18","wires":[["5f9326f8.cc5528"]]},

{"id":"5f9326f8.cc5528","type":"switch","name":"temp thresh","property":"payload",

"rules":[{"t":"lte","v":40,"v2":0},{"t":"gt","v":40,"v2":0}],"checkall":"true","outputs":2,"x":496.5,"y":315,"z":"47cda0

51.8d4c18",

"wires":[["8470617.2a0cba"],["39314ca6.c71afc"]]},{"id":"2fab48da.b0a998","type":"debug","name":"cpu

status","active":true,"complete":"false","x":807.5,"y":312,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18", "wires":[]},

{"id":"e344143.da0b3e8","type":"debug","name":"device

data","active":false,"complete":"false","x":347.5,"y":225,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18","wires":[]},

{"id":"8470617.2a0cba","type":"template","name":"safe","template":"Temperature ({{payload}}) within safe

limits","x":660.5,"y":266,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18","wires":[["2fab48da.b0a998"]]},

{"id":"39314ca6.c71afc","type":"template","name":"danger","template":"Temperature ({{payload}})

critical","x":659.5,"y":360,"z":"47cda051.8d4c18","wires":[["2fab48da.b0a998"]]}]

Used to store or exchange flow definitions. Not intended to be read or written by

humans.

Node-RED and the Internet of Things

In a deviceIn Bluemix

The board lights LEDs in response to the sentiment of a Twitter stream.

Node-RED running in a device

Bluemix Internet of Things Foundation Boilerplate

• Bluemix IoT Foundation Starter Boilerplate for

getting going quickly

• For use with real devices or simulators

• Node-RED editor and runtime customised with

IoTF nodes in its palette

Nodes for IoT Foundation

• Standard MQTT input and output nodes

• Available in the regular Node-RED build

• If you use these, you have to enter clientID, credentials and

Topic strings that match the IoTF conventions

• Bluemix-ready IoTF input and output nodes

• Preloaded in the IoTF boilerplate starter version of Node-RED

– Also available in the Node-RED node repository

• Nodes build the clientID, credentials and Topic strings for you

• Connect as an IoTF application

• Device-side IoTF nodes

• Connect as an IoTF device

16

Additional Nodes preloaded in the Boilerplate

• IBM Push

• Node for the Bluemix Push Service

• IBM HDFS

• Write data into the Bluemix HDFS Service

17

Using the App Input Node in a Bluemix Application

Access via Bluemix service

Says we want to receive events

Lets us listen only for events from a given device type

The ID of a specific device (or all devices registered to the IOTF organization that match the type)

A device might generate more than one type of event

It might generate more than one format of message

The “All” checkbox wildcards the entry, and can be used either when you want to subscribe to more than one value. You can also use it if there’s only one match but you don’t want to enter a value in the corresponding box.

API Key is picked up from the Bluemix environment.

The Node connects using an Application Style Client ID

Using the App Output Node in a Bluemix Application

Access via Bluemix service

Says we want to send commands

To a specific device type (id’s aren’t necessarily unique across different device types)

To a specific device

A device might accept more than one type of command

This indicates the format that is used to encode the command

Default data to include in the command

The command itself can either be passed into the Output Node from nodes earlier on in the flow, or hardcoded here

Patterns of use

IoT Node-RED patterns

Bluemix Device

1 Application Assembly and Wiring

2 Event Mediation -

3 Device Adaptor

4 Device Simulator -

5 Status Monitoring -

These patterns suggest some ways in which you can use Node-RED

• In this kind of pattern you use Node-RED to build all or part of an application to

process data from devices (Node-RED is being used as a quick way to write

Node.js application)

• The Node-RED flow uses one or more Input Nodes to connect to IoTF. It then

uses these nodes to subscribe to receive events from one or more devices

• Some application logic may be coded in the flow itself, but the flow might also

be composed with other Bluemix services (e.g. IBM Push)

• The application might also want to send commands to devices, using an IoTF

Output Node (for example if it is doing home automation/remote control)

Pattern 1 – Application Assembly in Bluemix

• This pattern of Node-RED flow is used to take event data from one or more

devices and then mediate it before forwarding it on to applications. Mediation

could include

• reformatting the event data

• filtering data out of a given event

• filtering out an entire event

• The mediation flow uses one or more Input Nodes to connect to IoTF to read

incoming messages. It uses other Node-RED nodes to mediate them, and then

uses an IoTF Output node to publish them back to IoTF.

• The output node publishes to an IoTF device topic that corresponds to a “virtual”

IoT Foundation Registered Device. IoTF applications read its data in the same

way that they read data from real Devices

• WARNING: Make sure you don’t inadvertently create a Node-RED flow

that publishes messages to the topic that it is listening on.

Pattern 2 – Event Mediation

• These flows use Node-RED to adapt a non-MQTT device so that it can connect

into the IoT Foundation as a registered device.

• This pattern is similar to the Event Mediation pattern except that it receives

events directly from the device and not via the IoTF.

• The flow collects data from the real device via an appropriate input node (a

generic protocol node or a device-specific one), uses Node-RED nodes to

manipulate the data from the device and then uses an Output node to publish

the event to IoTF as a device.

Pattern 3 – Device Adaptor

Primary Environment: Gateway

Secondary Environment: Bluemix

• In these patterns you use Node-RED to simulate a device which you can then

use to test your backend application.

• It’s similar to the Device adaptor except that it generates its own data. Also it is

more likely to run in Bluemix than in a gateway or device.

• The flow uses Node-RED nodes to generate (or replay) simulated data and then

uses an Output node to publish the event to IoTF as a device.

Pattern 4 – Device Simulator

• The IoT Foundation publishes status messages when devices (or applications)

connect or disconnect. In these patterns you use Node-RED to monitor the

availability of your devices (or possibly your apps). This could be to provide

some kind of alert to page someone if a device has gone offline unexpectedly.

• The flow uses one or more Input Nodes to connect to IoTF. It then uses these

nodes to subscribe to receive status events related to one or more devices

• You might also want to monitor status in a Pattern 1 style application. This is so

that an application can send a command to a device if that device is online, but

take some other action (for example call ibmpush) if it is offline.

Pattern 5 – Status Monitor

Application or Device?

• The Bluemix IoT nodes always connect as an IOTF Application, not as a Device. This allows an Output Node to send data purporting to be from any device in the organization, including unregistered devices.

• This could be advantageous in pattern 2 use cases as it means that a single mediation flow can mediate data from multiple input devices, republishing each device’s data on a new topic specific to that device

• In pattern 3, it allows a device gateway to multiplex several physical devices onto a single MQTT connection, rather than having to have a node and MQTT connection for each topic

• Be careful:

• Don’t run the Application nodes in an insecure environment. If you do and someone manages to extract the API Key from them, then they have the power to spoof any device in your IoTF organization.

Security Considerations

• By default, the Node-RED flow editor created by the IoTF boilerplate does not authenticate its users. This means that anyone who knows (or guesses) its URL can open the editor and modify the Node-RED flow – possibly modifying or redirecting your device data.

• To protect against this you must follow the steps given in the Node=RED documentation:

• Choose a username and password and generate a hashcode of that password

• Edit the bluemix-settings.js

• Redeploy Node-RED

• NOTE: These steps have changed in Node-RED 0.10

• You should also configure the application to use HTTPS rather than HTTP

• Reminder from the previous slide:

– Don’t run the Application nodes in an insecure environment. If you do and someone manages to extract the API Key from them, then they have the power to spoof any device in your IoTF organization.

Get started with Node-RED today!

• Build apps in Bluemix

https://www.ng.bluemix.net/docs/#starters/IoT/index.html

• Follow the IBM IOT community on Twitter @IBMIoT

• Visit the Node-RED website

http://nodered.org

• Press articles on Node-RED

–http://gigaom.com/2013/09/27/meet-node-red-an-ibm-project-that-fulfills-the-internet-of-things-missing-link/

–http://www.techrepublic.com/article/node-red/

–http://sdt.bz/content/article.aspx?ArticleID=68755&page=1

–http://www.programmableweb.com/news/node-red-makes-designing-iot-flows-snap/2014/06/09

–http://www.infoq.com/news/2014/05/ibm-node-red-qconlondon

Getting

started

Notices and Disclaimers

Copyright © 2015 by International Business Machines Corporation (IBM). No part of this document may be reproduced or

transmitted in any form without written permission from IBM.

U.S. Government Users Restricted Rights - Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GSA ADP Schedule Contract with

IBM.

Information in these presentations (including information relating to products that have not yet been announced by IBM) has been

reviewed for accuracy as of the date of initial publication and could include unintentional technical or typographical errors. IBM

shall have no responsibility to update this information. THIS DOCUMENT IS DISTRIBUTED "AS IS" WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY,

EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED. IN NO EVENT SHALL IBM BE LIABLE FOR ANY DAMAGE ARISING FROM THE USE OF

THIS INFORMATION, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, LOSS OF DATA, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, LOSS OF PROFIT

OR LOSS OF OPPORTUNITY. IBM products and services are warranted according to the terms and conditions of the

agreements under which they are provided.

Any statements regarding IBM's future direction, intent or product plans are subject to change or withdrawal without

notice.

Performance data contained herein was generally obtained in a controlled, isolated environments. Customer examples are

presented as illustrations of how those customers have used IBM products and the results they may have achieved. Actual

performance, cost, savings or other results in other operating environments may vary.

References in this document to IBM products, programs, or services does not imply that IBM intends to make such products,

programs or services available in all countries in which IBM operates or does business.

Workshops, sessions and associated materials may have been prepared by independent session speakers, and do not

necessarily reflect the views of IBM. All materials and discussions are provided for informational purposes only, and are neither

intended to, nor shall constitute legal or other guidance or advice to any individual participant or their specific situation.

It is the customer’s responsibility to insure its own compliance with legal requirements and to obtain advice of competent legal

counsel as to the identification and interpretation of any relevant laws and regulatory requirements that may affect the customer’s

business and any actions the customer may need to take to comply with such laws. IBM does not provide legal advice or

represent or warrant that its services or products will ensure that the customer is in compliance with any law.

Notices and Disclaimers (con’t)

Information concerning non-IBM products was obtained from the suppliers of those products, their published

announcements or other publicly available sources. IBM has not tested those products in connection with this

publication and cannot confirm the accuracy of performance, compatibility or any other claims related to non-IBM

products. Questions on the capabilities of non-IBM products should be addressed to the suppliers of those products.

IBM does not warrant the quality of any third-party products, or the ability of any such third-party products to

interoperate with IBM’s products. IBM EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED,

INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A

PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

The provision of the information contained herein is not intended to, and does not, grant any right or license under any

IBM patents, copyrights, trademarks or other intellectual property right.

• IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, Bluemix, Blueworks Live, CICS, Clearcase, DOORS®, Enterprise Document

Management System™, Global Business Services ®, Global Technology Services ®, Information on Demand,

ILOG, Maximo®, MQIntegrator®, MQSeries®, Netcool®, OMEGAMON, OpenPower, PureAnalytics™,

PureApplication®, pureCluster™, PureCoverage®, PureData®, PureExperience®, PureFlex®, pureQuery®,

pureScale®, PureSystems®, QRadar®, Rational®, Rhapsody®, SoDA, SPSS, StoredIQ, Tivoli®, Trusteer®,

urban{code}®, Watson, WebSphere®, Worklight®, X-Force® and System z® Z/OS, are trademarks of

International Business Machines Corporation, registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. Other product and

service names might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current list of IBM trademarks is available on

the Web at "Copyright and trademark information" at: www.ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml.

Thank YouYour Feedback is

Important!

Access the InterConnect 2015

Conference CONNECT Attendee

Portal to complete your session

surveys from your smartphone,

laptop or conference kiosk.