Glossary · IIoT, data and AI
Semantic interoperability
German: Semantische Interoperabilität
In information exchange, semantic interoperability is the ability of different systems to exchange data with an unambiguous, shared meaning, so that the receiving system interprets and uses the data as the sender intended without manual translation. It builds on technical and syntactic interoperability and requires shared information models, vocabularies or semantic identifiers.
- IIoT
In one sentence
Semantic interoperability means systems exchange data with a shared, unambiguous meaning, not just in a compatible format.
Example
Because both systems reference the same ECLASS property for rated voltage, the planning tool reads the value from a supplier's AAS without mapping it by hand.
How it applies
- Engineering: Interoperability has levels: technical (the connection works), syntactic (the format is understood) and semantic (the meaning is shared). Many integration problems occur at the semantic level, for example when two systems call different things status.
- Integration: Semantic interoperability is achieved with shared models such as OPC UA companion specifications, Semantic identifiers from dictionaries like ECLASS or IEC 61360, and ontologies.
- Documentation: Documentation benefits in the same way: classification with shared vocabularies such as iiRDS lets content portals from different vendors use the same metadata.
Protocol vs. data model
A common protocol, such as OPC UA or MQTT, gives technical and syntactic interoperability. It does not ensure that both sides mean the same thing by a value. Semantic interoperability needs an agreed Data model or information model on top of the protocol.