scadalink-design/Component-DataConnectionLayer.md

Component: Data Connection Layer

Purpose

The Data Connection Layer provides a uniform interface for reading from and writing to physical machines at site clusters. It abstracts protocol-specific details behind a common interface, manages subscriptions, and delivers live tag value updates to Instance Actors. It is a clean data pipe — it performs no evaluation of triggers, alarm conditions, or business logic.

Location

Site clusters only. Central does not interact with machines directly.

Responsibilities

• Manage data connections defined centrally and deployed to sites as part of artifact deployment (OPC UA servers, LmxProxy endpoints). Data connection definitions are stored in local SQLite after deployment.
• Establish and maintain connections to data sources based on deployed instance configurations.
• Subscribe to tag paths as requested by Instance Actors (based on attribute data source references in the flattened configuration).
• Deliver tag value updates to the requesting Instance Actors.
• Support writing values to machines (when Instance Actors forward SetAttribute write requests for data-connected attributes).
• Report data connection health status to the Health Monitoring component.

Common Interface

Both OPC UA and LmxProxy implement the same interface:

IDataConnection : IAsyncDisposable
├── Connect(connectionDetails) → void
├── Disconnect() → void
├── Subscribe(tagPath, callback) → subscriptionId
├── Unsubscribe(subscriptionId) → void
├── Read(tagPath) → value
├── ReadBatch(tagPaths) → values
├── Write(tagPath, value) → void
├── WriteBatch(values) → void
├── WriteBatchAndWait(values, flagPath, flagValue, responsePath, responseValue, timeout) → bool
└── Status → ConnectionHealth

Additional protocols can be added by implementing this interface.

Concrete Type Mappings

IDataConnection	OPC UA SDK	LmxProxy (RealLmxProxyClient)
Connect()	OPC UA session establishment	gRPC Connect RPC with x-api-key metadata header, server returns SessionId
Disconnect()	Close OPC UA session	gRPC Disconnect RPC
Subscribe(tagPath, callback)	OPC UA Monitored Items	gRPC Subscribe server-streaming RPC (stream VtqMessage), cancelled via CancellationTokenSource
Unsubscribe(id)	Remove Monitored Item	Cancel the CancellationTokenSource for that subscription (stops streaming RPC)
Read(tagPath)	OPC UA Read	gRPC Read RPC → VtqMessage → LmxVtq
ReadBatch(tagPaths)	OPC UA Read (multiple nodes)	gRPC ReadBatch RPC → repeated VtqMessage → IDictionary<string, LmxVtq>
Write(tagPath, value)	OPC UA Write	gRPC Write RPC (throws on failure)
WriteBatch(values)	OPC UA Write (multiple nodes)	gRPC WriteBatch RPC (throws on failure)
WriteBatchAndWait(...)	OPC UA Write + poll for confirmation	WriteBatch + poll Read at 100ms intervals until response value matches or timeout
Status	OPC UA session state	IsConnected — true when SessionId is non-empty

Common Value Type

Both protocols produce the same value tuple consumed by Instance Actors. Before the first value update arrives from the DCL, data-sourced attributes are held at uncertain quality by the Instance Actor (see Site Runtime — Initialization):

Concept	ScadaLink Design	LmxProxy Wire Format	Local Type
Value container	TagValue(Value, Quality, Timestamp)	VtqMessage { Tag, Value, TimestampUtcTicks, Quality }	LmxVtq(Value, TimestampUtc, Quality) — readonly record struct
Quality	QualityCode enum: Good / Bad / Uncertain	String: "Good" / "Uncertain" / "Bad"	LmxQuality enum: Good / Uncertain / Bad
Timestamp	DateTimeOffset (UTC)	int64 (DateTime.Ticks, UTC)	DateTime (UTC)
Value type	object?	string (parsed by client to double, bool, or string)	object?

Supported Protocols

OPC UA

• Standard OPC UA client implementation.
• Supports subscriptions (monitored items) and read/write operations.

LmxProxy (Custom Protocol)

LmxProxy is a gRPC-based protocol for communicating with LMX data servers. The DCL includes its own proto-generated gRPC client (RealLmxProxyClient) — no external SDK dependency.

Transport & Connection:

• gRPC over HTTP/2, using proto-generated client stubs from scada.proto (service: scada.ScadaService). Pre-generated C# files are checked into Adapters/LmxProxyGrpc/ to avoid running protoc in Docker (ARM64 compatibility).
• Default port: 50051.
• Session-based: Connect RPC returns a SessionId used for all subsequent operations.
• Keep-alive: Managed by the LmxProxy server's session timeout. The DCL reconnect cycle handles session loss.

Authentication & TLS:

• API key-based authentication sent as x-api-key gRPC metadata header on every call. The server's ApiKeyInterceptor validates the header before the request reaches the service method. The API key is also included in the ConnectRequest body for session-level validation.
• Plain HTTP/2 (no TLS) for current deployments. The server supports TLS when configured.

Subscriptions:

• Server-streaming gRPC (Subscribe RPC returns stream VtqMessage).
• Configurable sampling interval (default: 0 = on-change).
• Wire format: VtqMessage { tag, value (string), timestamp_utc_ticks (int64), quality (string: "Good"/"Uncertain"/"Bad") }.
• Subscription lifetime managed by CancellationTokenSource — cancellation stops the streaming RPC.

Client Implementation (RealLmxProxyClient):

• Uses Google.Protobuf + Grpc.Net.Client (standard proto-generated stubs, no protobuf-net runtime IL emit).
• ILmxProxyClientFactory creates instances configured with host, port, and API key.
• Value conversion: string values from VtqMessage are parsed to double, bool, or left as string.
• Quality mapping: "Good" → LmxQuality.Good, "Uncertain" → LmxQuality.Uncertain, else LmxQuality.Bad.

Proto Source: The .proto file originates from the LmxProxy server repository (lmx/Proxy/Grpc/Protos/scada.proto in ScadaBridge). The C# stubs are pre-generated and stored at Adapters/LmxProxyGrpc/.

Subscription Management

• When an Instance Actor is created (as part of the Site Runtime actor hierarchy), it registers its data source references with the Data Connection Layer.
• The DCL subscribes to the tag paths using the concrete connection details from the flattened configuration.
• Tag value updates are delivered directly to the requesting Instance Actor.
• When an Instance Actor is stopped (due to disable, delete, or redeployment), the DCL cleans up the associated subscriptions.
• When a new Instance Actor is created for a redeployment, subscriptions are established fresh based on the new configuration.

Write-Back Support

• When a script calls Instance.SetAttribute for an attribute with a data source reference, the Instance Actor sends a write request to the DCL.
• The DCL writes the value to the physical device via the appropriate protocol.
• The existing subscription picks up the confirmed new value from the device and delivers it back to the Instance Actor as a standard value update.
• The Instance Actor's in-memory value is not updated until the device confirms the write.

Value Update Message Format

Each value update delivered to an Instance Actor includes:

• Tag path: The relative path of the attribute's data source reference.
• Value: The new value from the device.
• Quality: Data quality indicator (good, bad, uncertain).
• Timestamp: When the value was read from the device.

Connection Actor Model

Each data connection is managed by a dedicated connection actor that uses the Akka.NET Become/Stash pattern to model its lifecycle as a state machine:

• Connecting: The actor attempts to establish the connection. Subscription requests and write commands received during this phase are stashed (buffered in the actor's stash).
• Connected: The actor is actively servicing subscriptions. On entering this state, all stashed messages are unstashed and processed.
• Reconnecting: The connection was lost. The actor transitions back to a connecting-like state, stashing new requests while it retries.

This pattern ensures no messages are lost during connection transitions and is the standard Akka.NET approach for actors with I/O lifecycle dependencies.

LmxProxy-specific notes: The RealLmxProxyClient holds the SessionId returned by the Connect RPC and includes it in all subsequent operations. The LmxProxyDataConnection adapter has no keep-alive timer — session liveness is handled by the DCL's existing reconnect cycle. Subscriptions use server-streaming gRPC — a background task reads from the ResponseStream and invokes the callback for each VtqMessage. On connection failure, the DCL actor transitions to Reconnecting, disposes the client (which cancels active subscriptions), and retries at the fixed interval.

Connection Lifecycle & Reconnection

The DCL manages connection lifecycle automatically:

1. Connection drop detection: When a connection to a data source is lost, the DCL immediately pushes a value update with quality bad for every tag subscribed on that connection. Instance Actors and their downstream consumers (alarms, scripts checking quality) see the staleness immediately.
2. Auto-reconnect with fixed interval: The DCL retries the connection at a configurable fixed interval (e.g., every 5 seconds). The retry interval is defined per data connection. This is consistent with the fixed-interval retry philosophy used throughout the system. For LmxProxy, the DCL's reconnect cycle owns all recovery — re-establishing the gRPC channel and session after any connection failure. Individual gRPC operations (reads, writes) fail immediately to the caller on error; there is no operation-level retry within the adapter.
3. Connection state transitions: The DCL tracks each connection's state as connected, disconnected, or reconnecting. All transitions are logged to Site Event Logging.
4. Transparent re-subscribe: On successful reconnection, the DCL automatically re-establishes all previously active subscriptions for that connection. Instance Actors require no action — they simply see quality return to good as fresh values arrive from restored subscriptions.

Write Failure Handling

Writes to physical devices are synchronous from the script's perspective:

• If the write fails (connection down, device rejection, timeout), the error is returned to the calling script. Script authors can catch and handle write errors (log, notify, retry, etc.).
• Write failures are also logged to Site Event Logging.
• There is no store-and-forward for device writes — these are real-time control operations. Buffering stale setpoints for later application would be dangerous in an industrial context.

Tag Path Resolution

When the DCL subscribes to a tag path from the flattened configuration but the path does not exist on the physical device (e.g., typo in the template, device firmware changed, device still booting):

1. The failure is logged to Site Event Logging.
2. The attribute is marked with quality bad.
3. The DCL periodically retries resolution at a configurable interval, accommodating devices that come online in stages or load modules after startup.
4. On successful resolution, the subscription activates normally and quality reflects the live value from the device.

Note: Pre-deployment validation at central does not verify that tag paths resolve to real tags on physical devices — that is a runtime concern handled here.

Health Reporting

The DCL reports the following metrics to the Health Monitoring component via the existing periodic heartbeat:

• Connection status: connected, disconnected, or reconnecting per data connection.
• Tag resolution counts: Per connection, the number of total subscribed tags vs. successfully resolved tags. This gives operators visibility into misconfigured templates without needing to open the debug view for individual instances.

Dependencies

• Site Runtime (Instance Actors): Receives subscription registrations and delivers value updates. Receives write requests.
• Health Monitoring: Reports connection status.
• Site Event Logging: Logs connection status changes.

Interactions

• Site Runtime (Instance Actors): Bidirectional — delivers value updates, receives subscription registrations and write-back commands.
• Health Monitoring: Reports connection health periodically.
• Site Event Logging: Logs connection/disconnection events.