LF Edge Project expands footprint with two new projects
By Gina Rullo
LF Edge LF Edge, an umbrella organization within the Linux Foundation, has added two new Stage 1 projects, Nexoedge and NanoMQ.
Nexoedge is a multi-cloud distributed storage that enables applications and devices at the edge to store data in one or more clouds. The result of research from LF Edge Associate member, the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), Nexoedge offers reliable edge-cloud storage using Network Coding communication algorithms by sharding data into several coded components. Additionally, it applies Secret Sharing keyless encryption algorithms before data transmission from edge to cloud, offering privacy protection to only readable data on the edge side.
Network Coding has been the academic world's leading communication algorithm for the past two decades and the most significant communication invention from CUHK since the establishment of its engineering faculty by Nobel Laureate Professor Charles Kao in 1988.
NanoMQ is an ultra-lightweight and blazing-fast Message Queuing Telemetry Transport (MQTT) broker for IoT Edge. It helps users unify critical data in motion and data in use between Edge and Cloud in an efficient manner. NanoMQ has started to play an essential role in scenarios such as Connected Cars and is an excellent supplement to existing LF Edge projects like EdgeX Foundry, eKuiper, and more.
"LF Edge continues to grow across the ecosystem, and we are thrilled to welcome Nexoedge and NanoMQ to the project fold," Linux Foundation General Manager of Networking, Edge and IoT Arpit Jopshipura said. "Continued innovation across areas such as enhanced Edge-Cloud Storage and IoT data transfer to the Cloud is the next step in bringing collaborative open-source solutions to the edge and IoT."
NanoMQ will fill a vacancy.
"The Paradigm-shifting of edge computing brings new challenges for messaging. NanoMQ is here to fill the vacancy by unifying data in motion on the edge; it provides parallel processing of messages, heterogeneous computing on different kinds of OSes and CPUs, and data interoperability that merges fragmented protocols. We hope our work can ease other developers' burdens and accelerate the industrial revolution. Together, we're building a thriving open-source ecosystem," said JayLin Yu, Edge Computing Solution VP of EMQ and the initiator of the NanoMQ project. "According to the healthy and productive collaboration we have built with the NNG project, I believe it is vital for open-source projects to orchestrate with each other. LF Edge is a new paradise for breeding open-source culture in our generation."
Patrick Lee, cofounder of Nexoedge and CUHK Department of Computer Science and Engineering Professor, offered his insight on the project.
"We have been conducting applied academic research on improving the dependability of large-scale storage and networked systems. Nexoedge is built on our prior research applying the Network Coding theory to interconnect storage resources at a geo-distributed scale to address the performance, scalability, fault tolerance, and generality challenges in edge-cloud storage environments," Lee said. We hope that our research can bring substantial industrial impact to the storage community."
There is a market opportunity for LF Edge and Nexoedge to continue to innovate to one of Nexoedge’s cofounders.
"As businesses and governments establish their own new normal, 5G and edge computing will be necessary to deliver the automation, performance and cognitive insight required by many industries. There will be a large market opportunity for LF Edge and Nexoedge to propel further innovation and accelerate new services," Nexoedge Cofounder Aldous Ng said.
The Nexoedge team will explore integration opportunities across LF Edge projects by offering the critical edge storage component.
Although NanoMQ was born as an MQTT broker, it continues to expand the boundary of edge messaging. It has already been widely adopted in commercial scenarios where performance and compatibility matter, such as in software-defined vehicles and robotics. The future roadmap of NanoMQ is to evolve as a cross-domain messaging bus across vehicle-cloud and resolve data interoperability in sensor-fusion scenarios.
Gina Rullo is a freelance writer.
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