W3C

– DRAFT –
WoT TPAC F2F - Day 2

14 September 2022

Attendees

Present
Ben_Francis, Brent, Christian_Glomb, Geun-Hyung_Kim, Hiroki_Endo, Javad, Jiye_Park, Kawada, Kaz_Ashimura, Kevin_Dean, Kunihiko_Toumura, Manu_Sporny, Michael_McCool, Sebastian_Kaebisch, Shinya_Takami, Tomoaki_Mizushima
Regrets
-
Chair
McCool, Sebastian
Scribe
benfrancis, benfrancis1, kaz

Meeting minutes

Logistics

Day 2 logistics

Scribe

Kaz: will do for the 1st part

<kaz> s/kaz: will do for the 1st part//

Ben for the 1st part; Kaz for the 2nd part

Overview

<kaz> McCool's slides

McCool: The biggest problem with IoT is fragmentation

... Thing Descriptions describe the network interface of a Thing, and some metadata. Currently working on Thing Description 1.1
… A TD is an information model, serialised as JSON-LD, which means it can be imported into a RDF database and queried with SPARQL
… You can import external ontologies (e.g. schema.org) to do things like units
… Things must have a Thing Description
… Not just HTTP, we can also describe CoAP and MQTT and are currently working on standards for others like OPC-UA
… Thing Description describes an abstraction based on properties, actions and events at a high level, then protocol bindings to tell a Consumer how to carry out those interactions over a protocol
… Provides an abstraction so in theory a Consumer does not need to worry about the details of a protocol
… One of the problems with discovery is privacy, so we use a two stage approach to discovery
… Introduction, then exploration
… The initial URL used in the introduction phase has no private information, then you do a GET on the URL, authenticate, and use a standard API for a web service to get metadata about devices
… When describing brownfield devices, the TD can come from somewhere else, the devices themselves don't need to support the Web of Things
… One thing we didn't get to is geolocation-based search, but we are trying to figure out a way to do it through extension mechanisms in the short term, then address it in the next version
… Orchestration - there is a scripting API with an implementation called node-wot through the Eclipse Foundation
… Deliverables. We are hoping to go into CR (candidate recommendation) for Architecture, TD and Discovery, with a vote on September 21st, right after TPAC
… Aiming for a resolution by the end of the year
… w3.org/WoT is a website which links to everything else
… Recent activity. We have done PlugFests, the last one was a couple of weeks ago reading for CR and PR transition.
… In good shape for implementations of discovery. Also working on IETF registrations for various things.
… Currently discussing the next charter. There are some proposals about what to do next.
… There has been a lot of interest in WoT for smart buildings - building information systems
… Siemens have a project with the Desigo CC BIM, Takenaka Corporation have the CGLL platform, Bosch have the Ditto project
… This presentation is available on GitHub

Sebastian: We are currently finalising the charter which is running until the end of January. We are already designing a new charter and discussing the topics you would like to address. Use the chance to see what you would like to see in Web of Things "2.0".

McCool: If you go to the wot repo you will see a bunch of PRs (pull requests), with a set of proposals.

Sebastian: We can go to the first talk about the Community Group. The CG has existed for almost 10 years, Cristiano and Ege have re-started this group and are the current chairs. I'd like to ask if they can provide an insight into this new group.

WoT Community Group

<kaz> Sep-13 WoT CG minutes

Ege: Have changed from an incubation to an outreach activity. It may mean we have some conflicts with the WoT Interest Group, so need to work on a new setup.

<cris_> https://www.w3.org/events/meetings/05b36b01-51bf-4885-88ea-eac638159f71

Cristiano: We are organising an event a week from now. We are using the W3C calendar.

Cristiano: We already had some new people attend, which is our first success.

Cristiano: We will have a presentation about the SIFIS Home project (European project)
… Philipp Blum will talk about building a community
… We want to process to be a democratic process

Ege: The event is next Thursday.

Ege: We had maybe 20 people join, quite a few people we haven't met before. Some people were expecting a summary of the Web of Things. We maybe should have prepared something.
… Specific interest for smart cities and digital twins
… We had an idea to have an initial brainstorming/ideas session which is focused on digital twins
… Maybe we should take smart cities more seriously
… After TPAC we will use the marketing call for discussions regarding the collaboration with the CG
… Feel free to join the marketing calls on Tuesdays

Cristiano: We can jumpstart some discussion right now?

Sebastian: Maybe you can talk about the web page, tooling, spaces for people who are interested in latest news and so on

Ege: Here you can see the Web of Things web page. You can find information about the Web of Things Working Group activities, events.
… There is a developers section for people outside our activities with a variety of tools and software packages that have specific purposes. WoT is an open standard not a framework.
… We have learnt that the documentation page is the most popular page. Provides an introduction to the Web of Things.
… There is a videos section with some introductory videos, in-depth tutorials, results of previous meetings
… You can find us on GitHub and Twitter

Kaz: I am very concerned about the mixing up of Marketing work and WoT CG work. What is your rationale?

Ege: We will discuss this in the Marketing call.

Kaz: You are saying you would like to transfer the marketing activity to the WoT CG group? What is your rationale?

McCool: There are a lot of activities under the IG that we probably want to transfer to the CG. We have a timeslot where we do this, proposing we replace that timeslot with a CG call. If we have a marketing task force call and it's actually an IG call then that's fine but it's an IG meeting. Shouldn't have a call that is both because it's confusing
… from the point of view of the patent policy.

Ege: The marketing call is not a CG call.

McCool: In the future when we set an IG call, let's not use the marketing task force time slot. Let's be clear that it's a marketing task force call or a CG call, it can't be both.

Ege: It is an IG marketing call, there is no regular CG call.

Kaz: We have been holding an IG marketing call regularly. You would like to invite CG people to that call regularly. That is a problem.

Cristiano: Probably a misunderstanding. We are not going to have this mixed call. We will have discussions separately, then when the time comes we will connect together.

Kaz: When and who will organise what meeting and talk about what topics?

Ege: IG organises the marketing call, IG members can come to that call to discuss what they are OK with giving to the CG. Once there's an agreement that can be passed to the CG.

Kaz: You are expecting that the IG would like to transfer deliverables to the CG.

Ege: The marketing task force has no deliverables.

McCool: We are running out of time. The IG needs to discuss this on the IG call. Only IG members will be attending.

Kaz: Please have internal discussions within the CG group separately and clarify the expectations of participants first.

McCool: I think we are in violent agreement.

Kaz: Do they want to work for the IG task force instead? If so, please discuss that point with them.

Kaz: We need to clarify the relationship between the IG and CG.

Ege: I agree.

Kaz: You have not been doing any discussion about deliverables on the CG side?

<Mizushima> +1 kaz

Sebastian: I am surprised by this discussion. The CG has a charter definition which clearly states the scope. Perhaps the confusion is that we see the same people active in the CG, IG and WG. Perhaps there is some confusion regarding which group you are acting under.

<McCool> (we really need to move on with the agenda)

Sebastian: I think we should be careful about what we are considering. When I was active in the marketing task force, we agreed that it is complicated to be isolated only within the WG because we receive a lot of input from people not in the IG.
… Sometimes there are touch points between CG and IG marketing. In my understanding there are separate CG meetings for people who are not members of the IG and are not invited to the marketing call.

Kaz: We carefully removed mixing up from the community group charter, but that mixture has started again.

Sebastian: Next is Tomoaki-san who will talk about the Japanese CG

WoT Japanese CG

WoT-JP CG slide

Mizushima: will introduce the activity
… [slide 2]
… Web of Things (WoT)
… (gives basic overview of WoT in general)
… [slide 3]
… Our expectation for the future society using WoT

<McCool> (actually, my apologies, it seems we still had a lot of time in the agenda. However, while I do think we need to resolve this, I don't think we should spend 15m on this issue right now)

(agree; and would suggest we continue the discussion carefully)

Mizushima: would like to promote WoT in Japan
… [slide 4]
… 4 goals here
… outreach, deployment, use cases and translation
… [slide 5]
… 4 TFs to achieve the goals
… [slide 6]
… Outreach TF
… promote WoT in the JP industry
… organized 5 events
… kickoff, demo, ECHONET collaboration, use cases, smart buildings
… [slide 7]
… Deployment TF
… to provide guidelines and manuals
… generating a portal site
… [slide 8]
… Translation TF
… Japanese localization
… WoT Architecture 1.0 done and transferred to TTC
… [slide 9]
… Use Cases TF
… colect industrial us cases
… upcoming events: hackathon, ideathon
… [slide 10]
… SDO collaboration
… introduce and discuss the availability of WoT
… ECHONET, IPA DADC, IEC SC3D
… smart home, smart buildings, IoT vocabulary
… [slide 11]
… Relationship with WoT-WG/IG
… cooperation via information exchange

McCool: slides are available on GitHub
… question on translation
… 1.1 version?

Mizushima: planning to work on them as well
… so far working on 1.0

McCool: wondering about the timing
… it takes a lot of time to translate the specs
… would assume you work on 1.1 versions as well
… maybe post PR

Daniel: similar question
… going to automatic?
… or translate chapter by chapter?

Mizushima: automatic translation is nice
… but unfortunately, there are still problems
… so we need to review it

Kaz: helped them work on the translation

<Mizushima> ?

Kaz: actually, there was a nice translation generated by a great translater, Kamitsuna-san

<McCool> (ege, can you check in slides on github)

Kaz: they used it as the basis

<Ege> the link for the CG presentation: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1jTlSKw7VfIx5J2degldyugGwJFjxPZ_p/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=106655031772979203612&rtpof=true&sd=true

<Ege> mccool the slides as pdf are uploaded to GitHub

<Ege> https://github.com/w3c/wot/blob/main/PRESENTATIONS/2022-09-hybrid-f2f/2022-09-13-WoT-CG-TPAC.pdf

TPAC Brakouts

WoT Demo

McCool: WoT demo breakout will be at 3:00pm-4:00pm
… Smart Cities breakout will be at 4:30pm-5:30pm
… McCool and Ezell to show retail, home assistance integration

Smart Cities

Kaz's slides

Kaz: A presentation about smart cities and how to proceed. Discusses ECHONET
… ISO/IEC JTC1
… IEC SC3D
… IPA DADC
… ITU-T SG20
… OGC
… W3C
… What is still missing for smart cities, next steps
… Smart cities is a large topic, maybe start with web-based digital twins

McCool: Have discussed a smart cities IG. Kaz is suggesting we narrow it and talk about digital twins. Digital twins are also a big topic. SDOs we need to work with. Tabled for the next charter, but not decided.
… Digital twins. One aspect is physical metadata. Right now we have a lot of metadata about the network interface, but not much about the physical thing. E.g. location, user interface. Things you care about for a digital twin. Have been talking to accessibility group. May want to annotate a digital twin, translate into different sensory modalities.
… TD doesn't currently talk about the physical interface.

Kaz: What is missing.... Guidelines for real world engineering, data transfer and distribution

Kaz: W3C as a central hub for collaborative discussion

McCool: Complicated. I can think of another half dozen organisations not on this list. So many organisations.

Lagally: We see all the SDOs on this list, there are already many of those. Need to start working on focused use cases. Don't think complete twin of a city down to a smart home will be a requirement, need a focused discussion. May be some additional work required here.

McCool: Geolocation comes up a lot

McCool: Need workshops to explore use cases. Workshops we've had have had very few attendees from actual cities. Need them to tell us what their use cases are.

Lagally: We already have some use cases

McCool: I think there will be many more. One target of the group is to generate a use cases document to identify gaps.

Ben: people treating digital twins differently

Lagally: we have looked into several kinds of meta data
… go into individual approach by those SDOs is important
… possible requirements for TD and Profile, etc.

McCool: we've started to talk with Microsoft DTDL as well
… need to think about how to satisfy the gaps in this area

McCool: fyi, there will joint discussion on RDF canonicalization on Friday, Sep. 16

Brent: will have joint discussion with them

AOB

McCool: voice integration for accessibility purposes
… home assistance integration to be shown during the breakout session
… e.g., Google Home

Kaz: we should consider those existing mechanisms in addition to the SDO collaboration

Ben: the Web Thing CG will have a meeting tomorrow, Sep 15
… 8:30-10:30am PDT

<benfrancis> https://www.w3.org/events/meetings/c7ce6c53-6436-4c09-91c9-97ec01ffe7f3

DID and VC

McCool: (shows Kaz's smart cities slides including WoT+DID+VC)
… possible resolution mechanism via DID
… VC will meet on Friday
… TD signing for the next WoT Charter

Manu: sounds great
… we have Brent as the WG Chair as well
… using DID for identifying IoT devices would make sense
… could be small binary data
… DID key has been expressed as public key
… some basic version of encryption, e.g., 64-bit or 256-bit
… as either a primary identifier or a secondary identifier

McCool: one possible solution for the identifier for IoT purposes
… a typical question with home IoT
… need some kind of standardized mechanism

Manu: have your had discussion on identification of valid devices?

McCool: the issue is
… need process to list
… issue about onboarding is on the list
… OPC UA device is one thing
… get back to the challenge of the current DID mechanism
… so many DID methods there
… think about requirements first
… or starting with methods?

Manu: DID holding rechartering discussion

Brent: DID Rubric
… trying registry of DIDs
… as a mean of using different DID methods based on the need
… looking at the possibility of standardization for specific DID methods
… end-to-end DID-based mechanism
… related discussion by DIDComm on IoT purposes

McCool: we're discussing minimum size of IoT devices
… minimum functionality and cost
… also there is an immerging standard named Matter

Manu: speaking to payload sizes
… discussion on minimize the data size, e.g., using CBOR
… includes digital signature
… another set of work done as well
… canonicalization template
… inject data into the message

<Geun-Hyung_Kim> s /CBOR/CBOR-LD

Manu: their mechanism to reduce the memory footpoint

McCool: we're discussing an alternative data format than TD
… CBOR is an option
… also template for TD
… that is Thing Model (TM)

Manu: hash linking, etc., has been discussed as well

McCool: the other point is canonicalization of the HASH tag

Manu: from the privacy viewpoint
… the best practice is downloading the cache

McCool: meant to be open for WoT
… downloading the cache would be good for the proxy

Manu: particular use cases for that purpose
… another point on canonicalization
… working on data integrity
… use different canonicalization algorithm
… using JCS
… if you want to, you can define your own canonicalization algorithm

McCool: one issue is generation of HASH
… what if you have CBOR or YAML serialization

Manu: should think about what might be the best use cases

Lagally: if we WoT want to go VC and JCS, what would be the time frame?

Manu: would not be difficult to integrate JCS algorithm

Kaz: would suggest we continue collaborative discussions

McCool: yeah, let's continue offline discussions

Post-TPAC meeting

Sebastian: we'll continue discussion next week as the Post-TPAC meeting

[adjourned]

Minutes manually created (not a transcript), formatted by scribe.perl version 147 (Thu Jun 24 22:21:39 2021 UTC).