OASIS Open Building Information Exchange (oBIX) TC
Enabling mechanical and electrical control systems in buildings to communicate with enterprise applications
Completed:
The Technical Committee was closed by TC Administration on 14 April 2021 and is no longer active. Archives of its work remain publicly accessible and are linked from this page. OASIS appreciates the efforts of all those who participated in this TC.Table of Contents
- Announcements
- Overview
- Technical Work Produced by the Committee
- Expository Work Produced by the Committee
- External Resources
- Mailing Lists and Comments
- Additional Information
2019.07.17:
The oBIX TC is currently monitoring implementations of the Committee Specification and answering any questions it receives. It is not actively meeting or working on specifications. The TC may, in the future, choose to release updates to address specific questions or to advance the oBIX specifications as Candidate OASIS Standards. Questions or comments can be sent to the obix-comment@lists.oasis-open.org mailing list as explained in the Send A Comment link above.
2014.01.17:
The TC has begun discussion of broadcast and peer-to-peer interactions for OBIX 2.0. This joins service interactions and potential WS-Calendar interactions on the work plan. The Committee invites other suggestions for inclusion in OBIX 2.0.
2014.01.15:
30-day public reviews begin for five specifications begins. The original announcement with nstructions for commenting are at https://www.oasis-open.org/news/announcements/30-day-public-review-for-5-open-building-information-exchange-obix-committee-spec.
- oBIX v1.1 provides the core information model and interactions for interactions with building control systems. It also describes the default XML encoding for oBIX.
- Encodings for oBIX: Common Encodings v1.0 specifies different encodings for oBIX objects adhering to the oBIX object model. Elaborates the XML encodinge used in the core specification as well as common alternate encodings, including CoAP, EXI, and JSON.
- Bindings for oBIX: REST Bindings v1.0 specifies REST bindings for oBIX. REST can be used in conjunction with XML, EXI, CoAP, and JSON encodings, as well as other encodings that may be specified elsewhere.
- Bindings for oBIX: SOAP Bindings v1.0 specifies SOAP protocol bindings for oBIX. The specification incldues a WSDL artifact.
- Bindings for oBIX: WebSocket Bindings v1.0 specifies WebSocket protocol bindings for oBIX.
2013.07.26:
Four Committee Specification Drafts (CSDs) begin 30-day public review:
oBIX Version 1.1Public Review Draft 01
Encodings for oBIX: Common Encodings Version 1.0 Public Review Draft 01
Bindings for oBIX: REST Bindings Version 1.0 Public Review Draft 01
Bindings for oBIX: SOAP Bindings Version 1.0 Public Review Draft 01
oBIX 1.1 includes a Schema (CSD) and Bindings for SOAP contains WSDL. To obtain these normative artifacts, you can downliad the respective ZIP files - oBIX Version 1.1: The public review ends 28 August 2013 at 23:59 GMT. For further information, including instructions on how to submit feed back, please see the original announcement.
2013.07.15:
The Comiitee has begun work on advanced services of 2.0. Topics include peer-to-peer interactions, advanced queries, service oriented scheduling, confomance to energy standards, and other services that can aride over the 1.x "core"
2013.01.16:
oBIX has a preliminary new workplan that finishes 1.1 as a core specification, and develops additional specification for oBIX interactions with such BIM-derived standards as BAMie, COBie, et al. A key issue is how to incorporate WS-Calendar.
2010.06.02:
A new draft is available matching the current OASIS specification standards (which have changed since 1.0). This is mostly a direct port of the prior version which was "hidden" in the oBIX-XML subcommittee. You can find it in the Documents section.
2009.06.30:
oBIX was identified in the EPRI report to NIST to develop a national Smart Grid Roadmap as a specification critical to the development of the smart grid. www.nist.grov/smartgrid
2009.04.17:
The oBIX committee as begun discussions of a verion 1.1 of the specification. The goals of the revision are to eliminate some ambiguities in 1.0, to incorporate some schedule elements from WS-Calendar (in formation) and to add the conformance statements necessary to bring the specification to an OASIS standard vote.
2008.01.10:
We are creating a new sub-committee to develop a reference Specification for acquiring Enterprise-ready Building Systems. The reference specification will not deal with system performance or selection. Its realm is the characterstics of the interface that must be provided by the Building System integrator. The sub-committee plans to rely on the OASIS SOA Reference model. We invite interested parties to sign up.
2007.11.15:
The oBIX XML Standards SC has been hard at work and plans to finish updates to the core spec by the end of the year and to complete the scheduling model by the end of February 2008. After corrections and clarifications, the key adds to the core spec will be date and time objects to support the upcoming scheduling model.
2007.05.30:
We are actively recuiting members for a possible oBIX Implementation Committee. Please contact Toby Considine if you are interested in participating
2007.05.21:
We are actively recuiting members for the v2.0 Technical Committee, defining standard enterprise contracts. Please contact Toby Considine if you are interested in participating
2007.04.16:
The Emergency Management TC invoked oBIX in a scenario wherein building systems received direct notification from the Weather Service as part of a distribution element.
2007.03.26:
oBIX and NBIMS held a joint exploratory meeting to discuss how we could allign our efforts. See below for a description of NBIMS.
2006.12:
The Open Building Information Exchange v1.0 became a OASIS Committee Specification in December, 2006. The specification document and related files can be downloaded from:
- www.oasis-open.org/committees/download.php/21462/obix-1.0-cs-01.zip (Zip Archive containing editable source (Word), HTML and PDF and related files)-
Submitted comments (for this work as well as other works of that TC) are publicly archived and can be viewed at lists.oasis-open.org/archives/obix-comment/. br /> All comments submitted to OASIS are subject to the OASIS Feedback License, which ensures that the feedback you provide carries the same obligations as submissions of the TC members.
An oBIX 1.1 is being planned to address some minor wish list items that have come from within the oBIX community and from allied spaces.
Brian Frank has released a version of the oBIX tool kit for JAVA on SourceForge. Downloadable source can be found at oBIX SourceForge repository
The purpose of oBIX (open Building Information Exchange) is to enable the mechanical and electrical control systems in buildings to communicate with enterprise applications, and to provide a platform for developing new classes of applications that integrate control systems with other enterprise functions. Enterprise functions include processes such as Human Resources, Finance, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), and Manufacturing.
For more information, see the TC Charter and FAQ
Technical Work Produced by the Committee
oBIX v1.0 has been accepted as a Committee Specification. oBIX v1.0 can be downloaded by the public. (12/2006)
An open source JAVA toolkit for working with oBIX is being developed in parallel with the standard. THe JavA Toolkit for the standard can be downloaded from the oBIX Sourceforge repository
LonMark Japan offers a non-normative Japanese translation of the oBIX v1.0 Committee Specification.
Expository Work Produced by the Committee
See Brian Frank's high-level presentation on oBIX v0.11. (May 2, 2006)
Aaron Hansen prepared a summary of the nearly complete version 1 of oBIX in April, 2006.
An update on oBIX was presented at the Summer 2005 Facilities Maintenance and Operations Committee (FMOC) sponsored by the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS). The Powerpoint is available here.
Toby Considine's Spring 2005 view of the challenge of oBIX can be found in the Roadmap for oBIX (April 2005)
Peter Manolescue's introduction to oBIX is a good place to start. (August 2004)
A short list of Industry and Government Groups whose interests and purpose OBIX is designed to support
- Green Building XML, referred to as "gbXML", was developed to enable integrated interoperability between building design and engineering analysis tools.
- Fiatech - bringing information technology to capital projects
- HTNG.ORG - Hotel Technology Next Generation
- US Green Building Council
- IAI-NA - International Association for Interoperability in the building life-cycle
- GridWise Architectural Council - a Department of Energy program to tranform the electric system to create a society of devices that functions as an integrated transactive system
- NBIMS and buildingSmart are efforts to create a complete life-cycle data model for a building, extending beyond the design and construction focus of the IAI. Both efforts are trying to move beyong conformance to interoperability.
- UnitsML is a NIST-sponsored OASIS TC defining an XML-based specification to enable the unambiguous representation of units of measure
- EnergyPlus is a DOE sponsored building energy simulation program for modeling building heating, cooling, lighting, ventilating, and other energy flows. EnergyPlus is able to read BIM directly, so there is some interest in adopting a similar surface for oBIX.
- The OASIS Emergency Management TC sees several scenarios that would require a building to respond to oBIX contracts invoked within a distribution element.
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