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MQTT: share machine data without a separate link for every application

Production counters, machine status and measurements become useful when the right application receives them. GCG uses MQTT to share these data between machines, edge systems and IT. Control stays with the machine. Data becomes available for monitoring and further processing.

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What it is
A lightweight publish/subscribe protocol, originally developed for bandwidth-constrained connections.
Sparkplug as an extension
Sparkplug defines conventions for topics, messages and device state. Useful when systems need a shared industrial data structure. Not required for MQTT.
Targeted data sharing
For example, sharing machine status, production counters and measurements with monitoring and reporting. Transmission frequency and data volume are tailored to the application.
Alongside OPC UA
A gateway can collect machine data through OPC UA and distribute it through MQTT. This is one possible architecture, not a mandatory split between shop floor and cloud.

What GCG works through in the integration

  1. Which data, with what meaning?

    We agree topics, message formats, units and timestamps. A counter value is only useful when its machine and measurement time are clear.

  2. What happens during an interruption?

    We determine where buffering is needed and test reconnection, queued messages and duplicate processing. Restoring a connection does not automatically recover all missing data.

  3. Who may read or write?

    TLS, client identities, topic permissions and network segmentation belong in the design. Write commands need a separate assessment. Monitoring does not grant unrestricted machine access.

Here, MQTT serves data exchange. It does not replace deterministic motion control or machine safety functions.

Frequently asked questions

Is MQTT secure enough for industrial use?

Not automatically. Encryption, trusted client identities, restricted topic permissions, maintenance and network segmentation need configuration and testing. Simply opening an MQTT connection is not a security measure.

What does Quality of Service (QoS) mean?

QoS 0 sends without delivery acknowledgement. Loss is possible. QoS 1 may redeliver, so duplicates are possible. QoS 2 prevents duplicate delivery within the relevant MQTT protocol exchange. It does not guarantee that a database write or machine action happens exactly once end-to-end.

Are all messages preserved during an internet outage?

That depends on the client, broker, session settings, storage limits and buffering. We determine which data must survive an outage and verify this with interruption tests. A retained message is not a historical archive.

One data stream, multiple applications

  1. Machine / edge gateway

    Publishes selected measurements and events to agreed topics.

  2. MQTT broker

    Receives messages and distributes them to subscribed applications.

  3. Dashboard / database / cloud

    Receives relevant data without a separate machine connection for each consumer.

Example of a monitoring connection. The broker can run locally or in a hosted environment. MQTT does not require a public cloud.

MQTT.org (opens in a new tab)OASIS MQTT 5.0 (opens in a new tab)Eclipse Sparkplug (opens in a new tab)

What needs to change in your installation?

Tell us what is already installed and what you are running into.

Get in touch

+31 299 70 50 78 · info@globalcontrol.group