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Next-Generation SEMI Equipment Data Acquisition (EDA) Standards

Leveraging HTTP/2 technology to provide better, more efficient data transfers

By Albert Fuchigami, PEER Group
 

In today’s micro- and nano-electronics industries, the move towards Smart Manufacturing and Industry 4.0 have introduced new requirements and opportunities for collecting and sharing data. All companies in the microelectronics supply chain are seeking standardized data collection and automation strategies for big data transfers.

Equipment Data Acquisition (EDA) is a collection of SEMI Standards that define high-speed data publication from any equipment to any data consumer through web services. EDA helps address the increasing demand for big data applications that analyze real-time information reported by equipment, in order to improve throughput and quality. Also known as “Interface A,” the EDA suite includes SEMI E120, E125, E128, E132, E134, E138 and E164 could be leveraged in any high-technology industry that collects large volumes of data.

Technology has evolved significantly since the EDA Standards were first developed. Although the current implementation with SOAP/XML over the HTTP/1.1 infrastructure has served the Semiconductor industry well since 2005, we can now leverage new technologies to provide better, more efficient data transfers.

“With the evolution of Industry 4.0, advancing the EDA Standards with newer technologies will enable the flow of higher volumes of data throughout the manufacturing facility. Companies can analyze their big data to detect and predict problems, make informed decisions, and minimize equipment downtime,” says Mike Barrett, Director of Global OEM Sales at PEER Group.

 

Proposed Changes

The Diagnostic Data Acquisition (DDA) Task Force within the North America Chapter of Information and Control Technical Committee is working on proposals to replace the current HTTP/1.1 in the EDA Standards. HTTP/2 is the proposed replacement technology with gRPC and Protocol Buffers as the protocol framework on top. This combination provides the best performance and out-of-the-box support for multiple platforms and programming languages.

The following aspects of the technology advancement will contribute to improved performance:

  • Message Encoding: Today, the XML data format contains data and provides metadata (text-based). This will be replaced with Protocol Buffer, a binary encoding mechanism significantly more efficient at transferring data.
  • Message Negotiation: Today, SOAP transfers the data (text-based). This will be replaced with gRPC, a remote procedure call (RPC) framework that looks after packing and unpacking data and sending and receiving data via the communication protocol. This well-defined and proven interface will aid the integration with HTTP/2.
  • Message Communication: Today, HTTP/1.1 is used. This will be replaced with HTTP/2, a major revision focused on performance that uses new framing and allows for decreased latency on the wire and higher data compression. It is gaining adoption and is supported on cloud vendor services such as Amazon CloudFront and Microsoft Azure CDN. HTTP/2 supports pipelining and socket reuse for more efficient computer resource management.
     

Figure 1
Proposed Approach Using HTTP/2 with gRPC and Protocol Buffers

 

Next Steps

The DDA Task Force is developing ballots to incorporate HTTP/2 with gRPC and Protocol Buffers into the EDA suite as new standards and additional subordinate standards.

If you are interested in contributing to the development of these standards, or have any feedback on using this technology in EDA, please contact either of the DDA Task Force Co-Leaders: Albert.Fuchigami@peergroup.com or Brian.Rubow@cimetrix.com.

 

Get Involved

SEMI Standards development activities take place throughout the year in all major manufacturing regions. To get involved, join the SEMI International Standards Program at: www.semi.org/standardsmembership. If you have any questions regarding the SEMI Standards mentioned in this article please contact local SEMI Standards staff.

The next North American Diagnostic Data Acquisition Task Force Meeting is scheduled for April 10, 2018 in conjunction with the SEMI Standards North America Spring Meetings at SEMI Headquarters, Milpitas, California. There is no cost to attend SEMI Standards Meeting but registration is required.

 

Standards Watch
SEMI
www.semi.org
March 1, 2018