Regulation – 2022 (CBCS Scheme) INTRODUCTION TO IOT - 22ETC15H

Module 3:
IoT Processing Topologies and Types
Syllabus:
o DATA FORMAT:
 Structured Data,
 Unstructured Data
o IMPORTANCE OF PROCESSING IN IOT
o PROCESSING TOPOLOGIES:
 On-Site Processing,
 Off-Site Processing
 Remote Processing,
 Collaborative Processing
o IOT DEVICE DESIGN AND SELECTION CONSIDERATIONS
o PROCESSING OFFLOADING:
 Offload Location,
 Offload Decision Making,
 Offloading Considerations
o SUMMARY
Check yourself topics:
 Difference Between Microprocessors And Microcontrollers,
 Network Bandwidth,
 Network Latency
 RISC Versus CISC Processors,
 Volatile Versus Non-Volatile Memory
Text book:
1.SUDIP MISRA, ANANDARUP MUKHERJEE, ARIJIT ROY, “INTRODUCTION TO IOT”,
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS 2021

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3.1 DATA FORMAT:

 The Internet is a vast space where huge quantities and varieties of data are generated regularly and
flow freely.
 As of January 2018, there are a reported 4.021 billion Internet users worldwide.
 The massive volume of data generated by this huge number of users is further enhanced by the
multiple devices utilized by most users.
 In addition to these data-generating sources, non-human data generation sources such as sensor
nodes and automated monitoring systems further add to the data load on the Internet. This huge data
volume is composed of a variety of data such as e-mails, text documents (Word docs, PDFs, and others),
social media posts, videos, audio files, and images,
 However, these data can be broadly grouped into two types based on how they can be accessed and
stored: 1) Structured data and 2) unstructured data

3.1.1 STRUCTURED DATA

 These are typically text data that have a pre-defined structure.
 Structured data are associated with relational database management systems (RDBMS).
 These are primarily created by using length-limited data fields such as phone numbers, social security
numbers, and other such information.
 Even if the data is human or machine-generated, these data are easily searchable by querying algorithms
as well as human-generated queries.
 Common usage of this type of data is associated with flight or train reservation systems, banking
systems, inventory controls, and other similar systems.

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 Established languages such as Structured Query Language (SQL) are used for accessing these data in
RDBMS.
 However, in the context of IoT, structured data holds a minor share of the total generated data over the
Internet.
3.1.2 UNSTRUCTURED DATA
 In simple words, all the data on the Internet, which is not structured, is categorized as unstructured.
 These data types have no pre-defined structure and can vary according to applications and data-
generating sources.
 Some of the common examples of human-generated unstructured data include text, e-mails, videos,
images, phone recordings, chats, and others.
 Some common examples of machine-generated unstructured data include sensor data from traffic,
buildings, industries, satellite imagery, surveillance videos, and others.
 As already evident from its examples, this data type does not have fixed formats associated with it,
which makes it very difficult for querying algorithms to perform a look-up.
 Querying languages such as NoSQL are generally used for this data type.

3.2 IMPORTANCE OF PROCESSING IN IOT

 The vast amount and types of data flowing through the Internet necessitate the need for intelligent and
resourceful processing techniques.
 This necessity has become even more crucial with the rapid advancements in IoT, which is laying
enormous pressure on the existing network infrastructure globally.

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 Given these urgencies, it is important to decide—when to process and what to process?

 Before deciding upon the processing to pursue, we first divide the data to be processed into three types
based on the urgency of processing:
1) Very time critical,
 Data from sources such as flight control systems, healthcare, and other such sources, which need
immediate decision support, are deemed as very critical. These data have a very low threshold of
processing latency, typically in the range of a few milliseconds.
 Considering the requirements of data processing, the processing requirements of data from very time-
critical sources are exceptionally high. Here, the need for processing the data in place or almost nearer
to the source is crucial in achieving the deployment success of such domains.
2) Time critical,
 Data from sources that can tolerate normal processing latency are deemed as time critical data. These
data, generally associated with sources such as vehicles, traffic, machine systems, smart home systems,
surveillance systems, and others, which can tolerate a latency of a few seconds fall in this category.
 Similarly, considering the requirements of processing from category 2 data sources (time-critical), the
processing requirements allow for the transmission of data to be processed to remote
locations/processors such as clouds or through collaborative processing.
3) Normal
 Finally, the last category of data, normal data, can tolerate a processing latency of a few minutes to a few
hours and are typically associated with less data-sensitive domains such as agriculture, environmental
monitoring, and others.
 Finally, the last category of data sources (normal) typically have no particular time requirements for
processing urgently and are pursued leisurely as such.

3.3 PROCESSING TOPOLOGIES:

 The identification and intelligent selection of processing requirement of an IoT application are one of
the crucial steps in deciding the architecture of the deployment.
 A properly designed IoT architecture would result in massive savings in network bandwidth and
conserve significant amounts of overall energy in the architecture while providing the proper and
allowable processing latencies for the solutions associated with the architecture.
 Regarding the importance of processing in IoT as outlined in Section, we can divide the various
processing solutions into two large topologies: 1) On-site and 2) Off-site.
 The off-site processing topology can be further divided into the following: 1) Remote processing and
2) Collaborative processing.

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ON-SITE PROCESSING
 As evident from the name, the on-site processing topology signifies that the data is processed at the
source itself.
 This is crucial in applications that have a very low tolerance for latencies.
 These latencies may result from the processing hardware or the network (during transmission of the
data for processing away from the processor).
 Applications such as those associated with healthcare and flight control systems (real-time systems)
have a breakneck data generation rate.
 These additionally show rapid temporal changes that can be missed (leading to catastrophic damages)
unless the processing infrastructure is fast and robust enough to handle such data.

 Figure shows the on-site processing topology, where an event (here, fire) is detected utilizing a
temperature sensor connected to a sensor node.
 The sensor node processes the information from the sensed event and generates an alert.
 The node additionally has the option of forwarding the data to a remote infrastructure for further
analysis and storage

OFF-SITE PROCESSING
 The off-site processing paradigm, as opposed to the on-site processing paradigms, allows for latencies
(due to processing or network latencies); it is significantly cheaper than on-site processing topologies.
 This difference in cost is mainly due to the low demands and requirements of processing at the source
itself.
 Often, the sensor nodes are not required to process data on an urgent basis, so having a dedicated and
expensive on-site processing infrastructure is not sustainable for large-scale deployments typical of
IoT deployments.

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 In the off-site processing topology, the sensor node is responsible for the collection and framing of
data that is eventually to be transmitted to another location for processing.
 Unlike the on-site processing topology, the off-site topology has a few dedicated high-processing
enabled devices, which can be borrowed by multiple simpler sensor nodes to accomplish their tasks.
 At the same time, this arrangement keeps the costs of large-scale deployments extremely manageable.
 In the off-site topology, the data from these sensor nodes (data generating sources) is transmitted
either to a remote location (which can either be a server or a cloud) or to multiple processing nodes.
 Multiple nodes can come together to share their processing power in order to collaboratively process
the data (which is important in case a feasible communication pathway or connection to a remote
location cannot be established by a single node).
REMOTE PROCESSING
 This is one of the most common processing topologies prevalent in present-day IoT solutions.
 It encompasses sensing of data by various sensor nodes; the data is then forwarded to a remote server
or a cloud-based infrastructure for further processing and analytics.
 The processing of data from hundreds and thousands of sensor nodes can be simultaneously offloaded
to a single, powerful computing platform; this results in massive cost and energy savings by enabling
the reuse and reallocation of the same processing resource while also enabling the deployment of
smaller and simpler processing nodes at the site of deployment.
 This setup also ensures massive scalability of solutions, without significantly affecting the cost of the
deployment.

 Figure shows the outline of one such paradigm, where the sensing of an event is performed locally,
and the decision making is outsourced to a remote processor (here, cloud).
 However, this paradigm tends to use up a lot of network bandwidth and relies heavily on the presence
of network connectivity between the sensor nodes and the remote processing infrastructure.

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COLLABORATIVE PROCESSING
 This processing topology typically finds use in scenarios with limited or no network connectivity,
especially systems lacking a backbone network.
 Additionally, this topology can be quite economical for large-scale deployments spread over vast
areas, where providing networked access to a remote infrastructure is not viable.
 In such scenarios, the simplest solution is to club together the processing power of nearby processing
nodes and collaboratively process the data in the vicinity of the data source itself.
 This approach also reduces latencies due to the transfer of data over the network.
 Additionally, it conserves bandwidth of the network, especially ones connecting to the Internet.

 Figure shows the collaborative processing topology for collaboratively processing data locally.
 This topology can be quite beneficial for applications such as agriculture, where an intense and
temporally high frequency of data processing is not required as agricultural data is generally logged
after significantly long intervals (in the range of hours).
 One important point to mention about this topology is the preference of mesh networks for easy
implementation of this topology.
3.4 IOT DEVICE DESIGN AND SELECTION CONSIDERATIONS
 The main consideration of minutely defining an IoT solution is the selection of the processor for
developing the sensing solution (i.e., the sensor node).
 This selection is governed by many parameters that affect the usability, design, and affordability of the
designed IoT sensing and processing solution.

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 In this chapter, we mainly focus on the deciding factors for selecting a processor for the design of a
sensor node.
 The main factor governing the IoT device design and selection for various applications is the
processor.
 However, the other important considerations are as follows.
SIZE:
 This is one of the crucial factors for deciding the form factor and the energy consumption of a sensor
node.
 It has been observed that larger the form factor, larger is the energy consumption of the hardware.
 Additionally, large form factors are not suitable for a significant bulk of IoT applications, which rely on
minimal form factor solutions (e.g., wearables). Energy:
 The energy requirements of a processor is the most important deciding factor in designing IoT-based
sensing solutions.
 Higher the energy requirements, higher is the energy source (battery) replacement frequency.
 This principle automatically lowers the long-term sustainability of sensing hardware, especially for
IoT-based applications.
Cost:
 The cost of a processor, besides the cost of sensors, is the driving force in deciding the density of
deployment of sensor nodes for IoT-based solutions.
 Cheaper cost of the hardware enables a much higher density of hardware deployment by users of an
IoT solution.
 For example, cheaper gas and fire detection solutions would enable users to include much more
sensing hardware for a lesser cost.
Memory:
 The memory requirements (both volatile and non-volatile memory) of IoT devices determines the
capabilities the device can be armed with.
 Features such as local data processing, data storage, data filtering, data formatting, and a host of other
features rely heavily on the memory capabilities of devices.
 However, devices with higher memory tend to be costlier for obvious reasons.
Processing power:
 As covered in earlier sections, processing power is vital (comparable to memory) in deciding what
type of sensors can be accommodated with the IoT device/node, and what processing features can
integrate on-site with the IoT device.
 The processing power also decides the type of applications the device can be associated with.

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 Typically, applications that handle video and image data require IoT devices with higher processing
power as compared to applications requiring simple sensing of the environment.
I/O rating:
 The input–output (I/O) rating of IoT device, primarily the processor, is the deciding factor in
determining the circuit complexity, energy usage, and requirements for support of various sensing
solutions and sensor types.
 Newer processors have a meager I/O voltage rating of 3.3 V, as compared to 5 V for the somewhat
older processors.
 This translates to requiring additional voltage and logic conversion circuitry to interface legacy
technologies and sensors with the newer processors.
 Despite low power consumption due to reduced I/O voltage levels, this additional voltage and circuitry
not only affects the complexity of the circuits but also affects the costs.
Add-ons:
 The support of various add-ons a processor or for that matter, an IoT device provides, such as analog
to digital conversion (ADC) units, in-built clock circuits, connections to USB and Ethernet, inbuilt
wireless access capabilities, and others helps in defining the robustness and usability of a processor
or IoT device in various application scenarios.
 Additionally, the provision for these add-ons also decides how fast a solution can be developed,
especially the hardware part of the whole IoT application.
 As interfacing and integration of systems at the circuit level can be daunting to the uninitiated, the
prior presence of these options with the processor makes the processor or device highly lucrative to
the users/ developers.

3.5 PROCESSING OFFLOADING:

 The processing offloading paradigm is important for the development of densely deployable,
energy-conserving, miniaturized, and cheap IoT-based solutions for sensing tasks.
 Building upon the basics of the off-site processing topology covered in the previous sections in
this chapter, we delve a bit further into the various nuances of processing offloading in IoT.
 Figure 6.5 shows the typical outline of an IoT deployment with the various layers of processing
that are encountered spanning vastly different application domains—from as near as sensing
the environment to as far as cloud-based infrastructure.

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 Starting from the primary layer of sensing, we can have multiple sensing types tasked with
detecting an environment (fire, surveillance, and others).
 The sensors enabling these sensing types are integrated with a processor using wired or
wireless connections (mostly, wired). In the event that certain applications require immediate
processing of the sensed data, an on-site processing topology is followed, similar to the one in

 Figure.
 However, for the majority of IoT applications, the bulk of the processing is carried out remotely
in order to keep the on-site devices simple, small, and economical.
 Typically, for off-site processing, data from the sensing layer can be forwarded to the fog or
cloud or can be contained within the edge layer.

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 The edge layer makes use of devices within the local network to process data that which is
similar to the collaborative processing topology shown in Figure

 The devices within the local network, till the fog, generally communicate using short-range
wireless connections.
 In case the data needs to be sent further up the chain to the cloud, long-range wireless
connection enabling access to a backbone network is essential.
 Fog-based processing is still considered local because the fog nodes are typically localized
within a geographic area and serve the IoT nodes within a much smaller coverage area as
compared to the cloud.

 Fog nodes, which are at the level of gateways, may or may not be accessed by the IoT devices
through the Internet.

 Finally, the approach of forwarding data to a cloud or a remote server, as shown in the topology

in Figure,
requires the devices to be connected to the Internet through long-range wireless/wired
networks, which eventually connect to a backbone network.

 This approach is generally costly concerning network bandwidth, latency, as well as the
complexity of the devices and the network infrastructure involved.

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 This section on data offloading is divided into three parts:

 1) Offload location (which outlines where all the processing can be offloaded in the IoT
architecture),

 2) Offload decision making (how to choose where to offload the processing to and by how
much), and finally

 3) Offloading considerations (deciding when to offload).

OFFLOAD LOCATION
 The choice of offload location decides the applicability, cost, and sustainability of the IoT application
and deployment. We distinguish the offload location into four types:

EDGE:
 Offloading processing to the edge implies that the data processing is facilitated to a location at or near
the source of data generation itself.
 Offloading to the edge is done to achieve aggregation, manipulation, bandwidth reduction, and other
data operations directly on an IoT device.
 Computation takes place at the edge of a device’s network, which is known as edge computing.
 That means a computer is connected with the network of the device, which processes the data and
sends the data to the cloud in real-time.
 That computer is known as “edge computer” or “edge node”
 With this technology, data is processed and transmitted to the devices instantly.
 Yet, edge nodes transmit all the data captured or generated by the device regardless of the importance
of the data.
Example of Edge computing:
 Autonomous vehicle edge computing devices collect data from cameras and sensors on the vehicle,
process it, and make decisions in milliseconds, such as self-parking cars.
 In order to accurately assess a patient’s condition and foresee treatments, data is processed from a
variety of edge devices connected to sensors and monitors.

FOG:
 Fog computing is an extension of cloud computing. It is a layer in between the edge and the cloud.
When edge computers send huge amounts of data to the cloud, fog nodes receive the data and analyze
what’s important. Then the fog nodes transfer the important data to the cloud to be stored and delete

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the unimportant data or keep them with themselves for further analysis. In this way, fog computing
saves a lot of space in the cloud and transfers important data quickly.
 Fog computing is a decentralized computing infrastructure that is utilized to conserve network
bandwidth, reduce latencies, restrict the amount of data unnecessarily flowing through the Internet,
and enable rapid mobility support for IoT devices.
 The data, computing, storage and applications are shifted to a place between the data source and the
cloud resulting in significantly reduced latencies and network bandwidth usage.
 Fog computing uses various protocols and standards, so the risk of failure is much lower.
 Fog provides low latency.
 Fog includes millions of small nodes.
 Fog processing and storage are done on the edge of the network close to the source of information,
which is crucial for real-time control.
 Fog acts as a mediator between data centers and hardware, and hence it is closer to end-users. If there
is no fog layer,
 Fog architecture is distributed and consists of millions of small nodes located as close to client devices
as possible.

REMOTE SERVER:
 A simple remote server with good processing power may be used with IoT-based applications to
offload the processing from resource constrained IoT devices.
 Rapid scalability may be an issue with remote servers, and they may be costlier and hard to maintain
in comparison to solutions such as the cloud.
 A Remote Desktop server allows users to work from any location – at home, on the road, or in the
office. A network connection is not required.
 There is no additional hardware needed to link the remote user to the server. All that is needed is
access to the Internet and a web browser

CLOUD:
 Cloud computing is a configurable computer system, which can get access to configurable resources,
platforms, and high-level services through a shared pool hosted remotely.
 A cloud is provisioned for processing offloading so that processing resources can be rapidly
provisioned with minimal effort over the Internet, which can be accessed globally.

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 Cloud enables massive scalability of solutions as they can enable resource enhancement allocated to a
user or solution in an on-demand manner, without the user having to go through the pains of acquiring
and configuring new and costly hardware
 Cloud architecture is centralized and consists of large data centers that can be located around the globe, a
thousand miles away from client devices
 If there is no fog layer, the cloud communicates with devices directly, which is time-consuming.
 In cloud computing, data processing takes place in remote data centers
 Cloud is more powerful than fog regarding computing capabilities and storage capacity
 The cloud consists of a few large server nodes. Fog includes millions of small nodes.
 A cloud system collapses without an Internet connection

S.NO. EDGE COMPUTING FOG COMPUTING

Highly scalable when compared to edge

01. Less scalable than fog computing. computing.

02. Billions of nodes are present. Millions of nodes are present.

Nodes are installed far away from the Nodes in this computing are installed closer to the
03. cloud. cloud (remote database where data is stored).

Edge computing is a subdivision of fog

04. computing. Fog computing is a subdivision of cloud computing.

The bandwidth requirement is very The bandwidth requirement is high. Data

low. Because data comes from the edge originating from edge nodes is transferred to the
05. nodes themselves. cloud.

06. Operational cost is higher. Operational cost is comparatively lower.

High privacy. Attacks on data are very

07. low. The probability of data attacks is higher.

Edge devices are the inclusion of the

08. IoT devices or client’s network. Fog is an extended layer of cloud.

The power consumption of nodes is The power consumption of nodes filter important
09. low. information from the massive amount of data

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S.NO. EDGE COMPUTING FOG COMPUTING

collected from the device and saves it in the filter

high.

Edge computing helps devices to get Fog computing helps in filtering important
faster results by processing the data information from the massive amount of data
simultaneously received from the collected from the device and saves it in the cloud
10. devices. by sending the filtered data.

OFFLOAD DECISION MAKING

 The choice of where to offload and how much to offload is one of the major deciding factors in the
deployment of an offsite-processing topology-based IoT deployment architecture.
 The decision making is generally addressed considering data generation rate, network bandwidth, the
criticality of applications, processing resource available at the offload site, and other factors. Some of
these approaches are as follows.
Naive Approach:
 This approach is typically a hard approach, without too much decision making.
 It can be considered as a rule-based approach in which the data from IoT devices are offloaded to the
nearest location based on the achievement of certain offload criteria.
 Although easy to implement, this approach is never recommended, especially for dense deployments,
or deployments where the data generation rate is high or the data being offloaded in complex to handle
(multimedia or hybrid data types).
 Generally, statistical measures are consulted for generating the rules for offload decision making.
Bargaining based approach:
 This approach, although a bit processing-intensive during the decision making stages, enables the
alleviation of network traffic congestion, enhances service QoS (quality of service) parameters
such as bandwidth, latencies, and others.
 At times, while trying to maximize multiple parameters for the whole IoT implementation, in order to
provide the most optimal solution or QoS, not all parameters can be treated with equal importance.
 Bargaining based solutions try to maximize the QoS by trying to reach a point where the qualities of
certain parameters are reduced, while the others are enhanced.
 This measure is undertaken so that the achieved QoS is collaboratively better for the full
implementation rather than a select few devices enjoying very high QoS.

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 Game theory is a common example of the bargaining based approach. This approach does not need to
depend on historical data for decision making purposes.
 Bargaining theory is the branch of game theory dealing with the analysis of bargaining problems, in
which some parties bargain over the division of certain goods.
 Game theory studies interactive decision-making, where the outcome for each participant or "player"
depends on the actions of all.
 If you are a player in such a game, when choosing your course of action or "strategy" you must take into
account the choices of others.
Learning based approach:
 Unlike the bargaining based approaches, the learning based approaches generally rely on past
behavior and trends of data flow through the IoT architecture.
 The optimization of QoS parameters is pursued by learning from historical trends and trying to
optimize previous solutions further and enhance the collective behavior of the IoT implementation.
 The memory requirements and processing requirements are high during the decision making stages.
The most common example of a learning based approach is machine learning.
OFFLOADING CONSIDERATIONS
 There are a few offloading parameters which need to be considered while deciding upon the offloading
type to choose.
 These considerations typically arise from the nature of the IoT application and the hardware being
used to interact with the application. Some of these parameters are as follows.
Bandwidth:
 The maximum amount of data that can be simultaneously transmitted over the network between two
points is the bandwidth of that network.
 The bandwidth of a wired or wireless network is also considered to be its data-carrying capacity and
often used to describe the data rate of that network.
 The maximum amount of data transmitted over an internet connection in a given amount of time.
 Bandwidth is often mistaken for internet speed when it's actually the volume of information that can
be sent over a connection in a measured amount of time – calculated in megabits per second (Mbps).
 Bandwidth is an important factor when it comes to determining the quality and speed of a network or
internet connection
Latency:
 It is the time delay incurred between the start and completion of an operation. In the present context,
latency can be due to the network (network latency) or the processor (processing latency).

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 In either case, latency arises due to the physical limitations of the infrastructure, which is associated
with an operation.
 The operation can be data transfer over a network or processing of a data at a processor.
 Latency can be measured one way, for example, the amount of time it takes to send a request for
resources, or the length of the entire round-trip from the browser's request for a resource to the moment
when the requested resource arrives at the browser

 Latency is the literal time it takes for a packet of data to go from its origination and reach its
destination.

 The measurement of latency is measured in milliseconds. Just 50 milliseconds of latency — a time of less
than one-tenth of a second — can result in poor network and application performance
Criticality:
 It defines the importance of a task being pursued by an IoT application.
 The more critical a task is, the lesser latency is expected from the IoT solution.
 For example, detection of fires using an IoT solution has higher criticality than detection of agricultural
field parameters.
 The former requires a response time in the tune of milliseconds, whereas the latter can be addressed
within hours or even days.
 Critical Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity is an emerging concept in IoT development that enables
more efficient and innovative services across a wide range of industries by reliably meeting time-
critical communication needs

 Time-critical IoT applications (e.g., industrial control, digital twins, robotics, autonomous systems, and
immersive/interactive environments) Safety-critical applications, requirements, and fail-safe protocols.
Time coordinated computing and communications
Resources:
 It signifies the actual capabilities of an offload location.
 These capabilities may be the processing power, the suite of analytical algorithms, and others.
 For example, it is futile and wasteful to allocate processing resources reserved for real-time
multimedia processing (which are highly energy-intensive and can process and analyze huge volumes
of data in a short duration) to scalar data (which can be addressed using nominal resources without
wasting much energy).
Data volume:
 The amount of data generated by a source or sources that can be simultaneously handled by the offload
location is referred to as its data volume handling capacity.

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 Typically, for large and dense IoT deployments, the offload location should be robust enough to
address the processing issues related to massive data volumes

Unit Value Example

Kilobytes (KB) 1,000 bytes a paragraph of a text document
Megabytes (MB) 1,000 Kilobytes a small novel
Gigabytes (GB) 1,000 Megabytes Beethoven’s 5th Symphony
Terabytes (TB) 1,000 Gigabytes all the X-rays in a large hospital
Petabytes (PB) 1,000 Terabytes half the contents of all US academic research libraries
Exabyte’s (EB) 1,000 Petabytes about one fifth of the words people have ever spoken
as much information as there are grains of sand on all the
Zettabytes (ZB) 1,000 Exabyte’s
world’s beaches
Yottabytes (YB) 1,000 Zettabytes as much information as there are atoms in 7,000 human bodies

3.6 SUMMARY
 This chapter started with an overview of the various data formats available on the Internet and to
which various IoT solutions are exposed.
 The complexities in handling the numerous data formats available present a significant challenge to
the design of IoT-based solutions. In order to address these challenges, the importance of processing
in IoT is discussed.
 This discussion is followed by an introduction to various processing topologies, which can be chosen
to address the challenges of IoT processing.
 These topologies are broadly made up of two categories: 1) On-site processing and 2) Off-site
processing.
 The off-site processing is typically composed of approaches to offload data to locations which are not
the same as the one from which the data was generated.
 A discussion on processing offloading follows these topologies. Various offload location types, means
of deciding offload location and quantity are explained.
 Finally, the various parameters to be considered for offloading are discussed to enable the reader to
grasp the nuances of processing in IoT.

3.7 Check yourself topics:

Network Bandwidth,
 Network bandwidth is a measure of the data transfer rate or capacity of a given network.
 It's a crucial network measurement for understanding the speed and quality of a network.
Network bandwidth is commonly measured in bits per second (bps).

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 A good download speed is at least 100 Mbps, and a good upload speed is at least 10 Mbps.
 With 100 Mbps, you can watch Netflix or YouTube, attend Zoom meetings, and play most online
games on several devices at the same time

Network Latency:
 Latency can be measured one way, for example, the amount of time it takes to send a request for
resources, or the length of the entire round-trip from the browser's request for a resource to the moment
when the requested resource arrives at the browser

 Latency is the literal time it takes for a packet of data to go from its origination and reach its
destination.

RISC versus CISC Processors,

Difference between microprocessor and microcontroller

 The IC of a Microprocessor just has a particular CPU inside it Some common examples of the
microprocessor are AMD Athlon, Intel Core i7, Broadcom BCM2711, Raspberry Pi, etc.,
 The Microcontroller IC also has ROM, RAM, and other instruments attached to it. Some popular
devices of microcontrollers are STM32, Arduino UNO, ATmega328, PIC16F877A, etc.

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 Difference Between Microprocessors And Microcontrollers,

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Volatile Versus Non-Volatile Memory

S. No. Volatile Memory Non-Volatile Memory

Non-volatile memory is the type of memory

Volatile memory is the type of memory in
1. in which data remains stored even if it is
which data is lost as it is powered-off.
powered-off.

Contents of Volatile memory are stored Contents of Non-volatile memory are stored
2.
temporarily. permanently.

3. It is faster than non-volatile memory. It is slower than volatile memory.

RAM(Random Access Memory) is an ROM(Read Only Memory) is an example of

4.
example of volatile memory. non-volatile memory.

In volatile memory, data can be easily In non-volatile memory, data cannot be easily
5. transferred in comparison to non-volatile transferred in comparison to volatile
memory. memory.

In Volatile memory, process can read and In Non-volatile memory, process can only
6.
write. read.

Volatile memory generally has less storage Non-volatile memory generally has more
7.
capacity. storage capacity than volatile memory.

In volatile memory, the program’s data are In non-volatile memory, any kind of data
8. stored which are currently in process by the which has to be saved permanently are
CPU. stored.

Non-volatile memory is less costly per unit

9. Volatile memory is more costly per unit size.
size.

Volatile memory has a huge impact on the Non-volatile memory has a huge impact on a
10.
system’s performance. system’s storage capacity.

In volatile memory, processor has direct In non-volatile memory, processor has no

11.
access to data. direct access to data.

Volatile memory chips are generally kept on Non-volatile memory chips are embedded on
12.
the memory slot. the motherboard.

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S. No. Volatile Memory Non-Volatile Memory

Advantages- Advantages-
 Fast speed  More reliable
13.  Low power consumption  Stores data permanently
 Better system performance as it  Inexpensive memory
increases speed  Helps in booting of operating system

Reduced Instruction Set Computer or RISC Architecture

 RISC stands for Reduced Instruction Set Computer Processor, a microprocessor architecture with
a simple collection and highly customized set of instructions.
 It is built to minimize the instruction execution time by optimizing and limiting the number of
instructions.
 It means each instruction cycle requires only one clock cycle, and each cycle contains three
parameters: fetch, decode and execute.
 The RISC processor is also used to perform various complex instructions by combining them into
simpler ones.
 RISC chips require several transistors, making it cheaper to design and reduce the execution
time for instruction
 The fundamental goal of RISC is to make hardware simpler by employing an instruction set that
consists of only a few basic steps used for evaluating, loading, and storing operations.
 A load command loads data but a store command stores data.

Complex Instruction Set Computer or CISC Architecture

 The CISC Stands for Complex Instruction Set Computer, developed by the Intel.
 It has a large collection of complex instructions that range from simple to very complex and specialized
in the assembly language level, which takes a long time to execute the instructions.
 So, CISC approaches reducing the number of instruction on each program and ignoring the number of
cycles per instruction.
 It emphasizes to build complex instructions directly in the hardware because the hardware is always
faster than software.
 However, CISC chips are relatively slower as compared to RISC chips but use little instruction than
RISC
 The fundamental goal of CISC is that a single instruction will handle all evaluating, loading, and

storing operations, similar to how a multiplication command will handle evaluating, loading,
and storing data, which is why it’s complicated.

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