STWS: A unified Web service for IEEE 1451 smart transducers

This paper describes a unified Web service for IEEE 1451 smart transducers, designated as Smart Transducer Web Services (STWS), developed at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) based on the IEEE 1451.0 standard. An STWS prototype system developed at NIST consists of a service consumer, service provider (wireless network node), and wireless sensor node. The service consumer and provider communicate with each other through Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messages using the IEEE 1451.0 and 1451.5-WiFi interfaces. The prototype system was successfully tested through a few case studies, and a case study of reading transducer data is described in detail. STWS enable Web-resident IEEE 1451 smart transducers (sensors and actuators) to be discoverable, accessible, and controllable using Web services via the Internet and to achieve standards-based interoperability for smart transducer applications.