When a company works on an IoT project, its team has to deal with many devices, tools and security specifications. This is where IoT platforms come into play, enabling data storage tracking, communication, security and collaboration across different teams.
When a company works on an IoT project, its team has to deal with many devices, tools and security specifications. This is where IoT platforms come into play, enabling data storage tracking, communication, security and collaboration across different teams.
The undeniable leader among IoT platforms is Amazon AWS IoT Services — a cloud service designed specifically for IoT software development and supported by Amazon Web Services. In this article, we will look at the main features of the platform, its benefits and some use cases.
What are AWS IoT Services?
AWS IoT Services is a cloud platform that works with thousands of connected devices and is capable of processing trillions of requests simultaneously. To store communication files and enable features, AWS IoT Services provides cloud infrastructure — the information is stored on Amazon Web Services servers.
What solutions can AWS IoT offer for IoT devices?
The Amazon Internet of Things platform basically connects IoT devices to the cloud. Each device transfers its information to the device's shadow. The shadow service will respond to requests and work with the application's functionality.
X.509 certificates engineer the communications between the real device and its shadow service. That's a basic idea behind the AWS IoT platform — let's take a look at its key solutions.
- IoT Device Management: a service that allows you to log, organize, secure, monitor and manage remotely connected devices and sensors. The service provides real-time statistics on application performance and allows uploading from multiple devices at once.
- IoT Device Defender: The Amazon IoT platform ensures that AWS cloud security reports are collected from all connected devices — these metrics are sent to Device Defender, which audits whether the metrics show abnormalities. If there is a strange access attempt or unnatural behavior, Defender updates AWS Cloud Watch, the IoT Console, and Device Management.
- AWS Lambda: a software development environment where developers can write and edit code, aggregate projects from other AWS services (including IoT), and run code once it's written. It's a platform for continuous deployment—developers can release code to the service one at a time, avoiding tech debt and bug clutter.
- AWS IoT Greengrass: physical devices that generate information (equipment, transport, etc.) are connected to Greengrass Connectors. Data from connectors is sent to Lambda and device shadows from the Greengrass Core. This is how data from the outside world arrives in the software.
- AWS IoT Analytics: the service creates analytics from IoT data. It is responsible for the collection, processing, storage, real-time machine learning analysis and code-based reporting.
What services are included in IoT AWS?
AWS IoT Services is an ambitious IoT management platform with dozens of features. If we were to focus on full functionality, you would be reading a 40 page ebook right now. To keep the guide brief, we've highlighted vital AWS IoT services that are essential for most IoT projects.
- Device Gateway: all devices on Amazon Web Services for IoT are connected to the Gateway. The service is responsible for maintaining connections between devices and a server even under low latency conditions. Device Gateway is the gateway to using the AWS IoT platform.
- Message Broker: this service allows connected devices to exchange messages with each other and with an application server. This tool is responsible for connectivity — it can process, store and organize thousands of messages simultaneously.
- Device Shadow: all AWS IoT devices on the AWS IoT platform have a virtual version — a shadow. It stores information about the state of physical equipment that you can access remotely. Here, you set performance parameters for IoT devices and even plan settings a year in advance.
- Rule engine: this tool places restrictions and enforces guidelines on data usage. The rule defines how devices process data. For example, you can specify a threshold and set a default for values above the threshold. AWS IoT rules will trigger the execution of certain AWS Lambda functionality, connecting hardware updates with software reactions.
The primary purpose of Amazon and IoT services is to connect IoT hardware and software code. The platform creates an environment for exchanging, organizing and managing secure data. Device state changes are saved in the system, where rules can trigger code changes.
What benefits does the AWS IoT Platform provide for businesses?
The AWS IoT Platform makes IoT development faster: code is available in AWS Lambda where it can be executed immediately, hardware is managed in the shadows, etc. That's not the only advantage—many benefits come into play after a product launch.
- Device Management: solutions responsible for device management, data organization, and cloud integration make it easy for developers and project managers to track product changes.
- Data security and connection security: AWS has strict access control algorithms — you can configure multi-step authentication and define user roles. The system continuously monitors software performance and detects suspicious patterns. You will receive an alert if something seems unusual.
- Improved data processing: the Amazon IoT platform uses AI to configure data storage and processing models. You can configure scenarios that will automatically run in the cloud. Data processing can improve your efficiency and speed with Machine Learning add-ons.
- Sizing of IoT projects: AWS IoT is connected to a productive infrastructure from Amazon Web Services. The service works together with robust services, which allows you to add new features. If you want to add machine learning to your IoT, use Amazon SageMaker. To increase data storage, you have Amazon S3. The fact that the Amazon IoT Platform is part of significant infrastructure is an advantage as you won't need to migrate to another service to add a new feature.
Want to explore the capabilities of the AWS IoT Platform? talk to us right now and see how we can help implement it in your business!
