Towards a node active replication schema for highly reliable distributed control systems based on TSN

Abstract

[eng] Given their nature, many control applications that arise from the integration of Operation Technologies (OT) and Information Technologies (IT) are built on top of highly reliable real-time (RT) Distributed Control Systems (DCSs). Since a DCS is made up of several computing nodes that exchange information through a communication subsystem, to achieve high reliability it is necessary that both this subsystem and the service from the nodes are very reliable. To provide RT highly reliable communications while benefiting from Ethernet’s advantages, Industry and Academia are pushing the Time-Sensitive Networking Ethernet standards (TSN). On the other hand, one of the most used strategies to ensure a highly reliable service from the nodes is to use fault tolerance in the form of active replication. Our general goal is to develop a complete fault-tolerant architecture (addressing faults both in the communication subsystem and in the nodes) for highly reliable real-time DCSs based on TSN. In this paper we show our ongoing work towards an active replication schema for the nodes of this architecture.