Cornice Engineering

Standards-Based Integration Using MultiSpeak® and the Common Information Model (CIM)

Integration of data-intensive automation applications has been an on-going challenge for electric utilities of all sizes – a challenge which has increased as demands such as the requirements for the Smart Grid have increased. A number of approaches were historically tried and until fairly recently they utilized costly, custom application interfaces that were an on-going maintenance concern for both vendors and utilities. The co-evolution of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA) MultiSpeak® Specification and the Common Information Model (CIM) from the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Technical Committee (TC) 57 Working Group (WG) 14 has changed all that.

Cornice Engineering principals have domain expertise with both MultiSpeak® and CIM. We are particularly proud of the evolution of MultiSpeak® that has occurred as a result of the collaborative efforts of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association and over 65 leading software vendors serving the electric utility market. We have been technical coordinators for the MultiSpeak® Initiative since its inception. MultiSpeak interfaces are in production use at over 500 utilities in more than 12 countries internationally to date. The user base includes rural electric cooperatives, municipals, public power districts, investor-owned utilities, and national utilities.

MultiSpeak® is an industry-wide open standard for integration of software used in utilities of all sizes. MultiSpeak® includes (i) a common data model that is documented in the form of a UML class model and an associated XML Schema as well as (ii) an extensive set of web services to support common utility business processes. The web services are documented in the form of web services description language (WSDL) computer-readable files to ease the development of compatible interfaces. The graphic above shows the extensive coverage of MultiSpeak® in the enterprise service bus environment.

Cornice Engineering is uniquely qualified to provide a full range of services pertaining to standards-based integration using either MultiSpeak® or CIM in utilities of all sizes.

These services include:

Business process modeling to support data model and web services design.
Creation and documentation of custom, utility-specific business processes using Unified Modeling Language (UML) tools.
Data model creation, modification, and documentation in XML Schema format.
Creation and modification of web services to suit utility needs and adding new methods to existing web services.
Identifying the most appropriate implementation of MultiSpeak-compatible or CIM-compatible application interfaces to meet the needs of the utility.
Working with vendors and utility developers to facilitate a smooth integration of disparate software applications.
Directing and assisting the utility in developing adapters for non-MultiSpeak- or non-CIM-enabled applications.
Consulting on implementation of MultiSpeak data model and web services.
Help developing extensions to MultiSpeak - additional data objects to the data model, extending existing data objects by the addition of XML attributes and/or XML elements.
Consulting on scalability of MultiSpeak web services. The power of MultiSpeak has been discovered by utilities of all sizes. Cornice Engineering can answer questions about the applicability to your particular situation.
Identifying how the utility installation can harmonize MultiSpeak’s power with the development that has been done on the IEC Common Information Model (CIM).
Seminars on understanding and applying (i) MultiSpeak data models and web services, (ii) understanding the current interoperability standards environment and on-going developments, (iii) understanding how the various interoperability standards developments can improve your utility’s Smart Grid deployment, and (iv) understanding the co-existence of MultiSpeak and CIM.

Additional Information

Additional technical information about MultiSpeak can be found at the MultiSpeak website (http://www.multispeak.org) and also in our Publications list. Questions can be answered directly at info@CorniceEngineering.com.

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Cornice Engineering, Inc. is a certified MultiSpeak Integrator

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