Overview

Traditional ISA-95 "automation-pyramid" integrations move data upwards through a stack of firewalls and proprietary databases. Every new use-case requires another point-to-point path; the result is spaghetti diagrams, data loss through aggregation, and weeks of lead-time each time someone asks "can I please add this tag to the dashboard?"

The Unified Namespace flips that flow:

  • Event driven – every device, PLC or app publishes its own events as they happen.

  • Standard topic hierarchy – a hierarchical key (compatible with ISA-95, KKS, or custom naming standards) encodes enterprise, site, area, … plus a data-contract that describes the payload, data sources and data sinks.

  • Publish-regardless mentality – producers do not care whether a consumer exists yet; that turns "add a new dashboard" into a reading exercise, not a PLC­-reprogramming project.

  • Stream Processing / Data Contextualization - Bridges give incoming data already a base contextualization and enforce schemas, Stream Processor allows you then to properly model the data top-down.

Architecture Benefits

The UNS eliminates the traditional automation pyramid's limitations:

  • No point-to-point complexity: All systems publish to and consume from one namespace

  • Schema enforcement: Data contracts ensure message consistency

  • Scalable fan-out: Add new consumers without touching producers

  • Event replay: Embedded Redpanda provides message persistence and replay capabilities

Topic Structure

UNS topics follow a strict Topic Convention:

This structure provides:

  • Location context: Hierarchical addressing (supports ISA-95, KKS, or custom naming)

  • Data semantics: Contract-based payload validation

  • Version control: Schema evolution support

Integration Patterns

Connect systems to the UNS using:

Learn More

For comprehensive understanding of UNS concepts and implementation:

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