Groovy Goes RFID with Smart Sensors for Real-World Control
TS-5386

Groovy scripting is integrated with smart sensors and a commercial RFID network controller to manage real-world interactions in factories and warehouses.

RFID applications frequently need to sense and control tagged objects, based on their identity. A typical scenario includes optical sensing of a case moving on a conveyor belt to trigger reading of the RFID tag. Similarly, reading the identity from a tag may trigger an actuator to redirect a case to a different destination. In general, there is a need to control an open-ended set of environmental sensors and industrial actuators based on RFID identities.

The Sun Java System RFID Software platform is one example of an RFID middleware system driven by a network controller. Readers are nodes on the net that are centrally discovered, provisioned, and managed by the central controller. Using Rio, the architecture generalizes easily to broader sensing and control tasks.

Smart sensors have been integrated into this RFID middleware platform by use of an adapter layer that interfaces third-party RFID readers into the framework. Using the Distributed Data Acquisition Control for the Java Platform (JDDAC) node software, a networked device based on the Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) and on Systronix's JSTIK microcontroller board is implemented, with support for many transducers through Opto 22 hardware. Both the transducers and their data follow IEEE 1451 conventions for self-description, enabling a plug and play approach. The JDDAC node device is available on the network as a peer to existing RFID readers.

Groovy is integrated into the RFID network controller, providing developers with a simple but powerful scripting facility to control sensing, triggering, and other interactions with the real world.

This presentation demonstrates a working system and walks through the Groovy scripts, showing their potential to address RFID customer requirements.

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