The Gateway is an industrial sector information source about the data protocols commonly used in the industrial sector for building automation and plant or factory automation. While the creators of many protocols claim that their protocol is the defacto standard, the industrial sector has no standard protocol, and several are used very commonly throughout the industry.
The common data communications protocols that are used in the industrial sector and discussed on this site include:
- BACnet
- EtherNet/IP
- Lonworks
- Metasys & Metasys N2
- Modbus
Each of these protocols have their own advantages and disadvantages and most often the choice of data protocol is determined by the OEMs of industrial and building automation systems. It is very common — often time inevitable — that industrial facilities will end up with different equipment and systems making use of different protocols. As a result protocol gateways are necessary to facilitate communication between devices and controlling systems.
The Gateway 