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The edge computing platform(s) (MEP) needs to be installed at the telco edge(s) and Application development/management related components (MECM (MEO+MEPM+Edge Connector), AppStore, Developer Platform) needs to be installed in Telco's cloud (private/public). Edge computing platform (MEP) provides a platform as a service environment for running "Enterprise Applications" In order to be useful, BP requires 5G RAN & UPF to enable connectivity & have configurations based on use case need. Also 5Gc and OSS system needs to be in place with desired configurations.

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Use Case

Diverse types of applications in various enterprise sectors, not limited to below:

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Architecture

Targeted architecture

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Center Node (Located at Telco Cloud)

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Edge Node components manages  the execution of various enterprise Applications, it provides various services which can be leveraged by edge applications for smooth functioning and its planned to provide additional aPaas services required for Machine Vision, Video Analytics , IoT Analytics etc in future releases. The MEP sites will be a single node  or a multiple node K3s Cluster, on which applications will be deployed by MECM module. The MEC Host will be hosted on a light weight OS.  

Edge Node will comprise of following:

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By leveraging upstream projects like EdgeGallery and In collaboration with other BP in same family "5G MEC/Slice System to Support Cloud Gaming, HD Video and Live Broadcasting" (5G MEC/Slice System to Support Cloud Gaming, HD Video and Live Broadcasting Blueprint - Tentative roadmap of integration other BP is Q3 2021Q2 2022), this BP intends to deliver targeted architecture.. 

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EALTEdge BP will leverage other BP in same BP family "5G MEC/Slice System to Support Cloud Gaming, HD Video and Live Broadcasting Blueprint" for dynamic Traffic routing & steering. Kindly refer that BP for any related SDO references/compliance.

Release 5 Architecture

In this release, BP has been upgrade from EdgeGallery version 0.9 to version 1.1. Also have enhanced Smart shelf in retail

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sample application.

EdgeGallery in version 1.1 has been added following new features.

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Below is release 5 architecture for details kindly refer platform architecture section.

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Note:

1. In release 5 to use BP, Either
   1.  UPF (external entity to this BP) needs to be pre-configured with DNS redirection rules and traffic rules to ensure connectivity.
   2. UPF integration via UPF adaptor for DNS redirection and traffic rules configurations 

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For Application Enablement API compliance details kindly check http://docs.edgegallery.org/zh_CN/release-v1.1/Projects/MEP/MEP_Interfaces.html#mep-server

Platform Architecture

The below diagram gives a overall architecture of the Enterprise Application on Lightweight 5G Telco Edge blueprint as given in Release 5. 

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Note: EALTEdge Blueprint Deployment has been tested on Cloud VM and is not tested on Bare-Metal Environment. Though, theoretically deployment should work in bare metal,  provided hardware and software prerequisites are met. Kindly refer R5 - Test Documentation of Enterprise Applications on Lightweight 5G Telco Edge (EALTEdge) to get details on the tested deployment.

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• Tools: Developer tools are used in Plugin Management, Plugin Life Cycle and grading systems making it more convenient for developers to develop applications and integrate them into the edgegallery platform.
• Workspace: Developers manage their own Application development process by creating projects or migrating projects. Developers can manage project, app package and test task management.
• PG DB: PostgreSQL database version 12.2 is being used.
• Portal: Provides user interface for application developer to interact with developer platform.
• Sandbox: Test environment for application developers to test their applications.
• ATP: application test platform for configure and  testing application against set of test cases. 

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• aPaaS:
  
  • Object Detection Service: This service can be used by developer app for various Object detection for example Bottle detection and count for Retail store inventory.
• PaaS:
  • Secret Management: Platform services and developer apps can use this service for sensitive info storing like password, cert etc.
  • Cert Management: Platform services and developer apps can use this service for automate certifications management.
  • Storage: Edge native storage for enterprise sites.
  • Backup / Restore: scheduled backup, disaster recovery for remote sites
  • DB: common DB: common DB for applications data 
  • Monitoring: system and apps health monitoring. 
  • CNI: k8s based networking for multi interface support in a POD for SFC scenarios, network policies etc.
• MEP Server:
  • DNS: DNS server and DNS record management service
  • Service Registry: Service registry and discovery, availability notifications
  • AppLCM: applications life cycle management
  • Network Isolation:  Provides separation of control, management and data plan
• API Gateway: Provides secure End points for MEP services as well as producer Applications.
• Edge Portal: Portal for autonomous edges.

Software Platform Architecture

The below image shows the software platform distribution and architecture for Release 5.0.

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EALTEdge Software Components 

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• Tools: Developer tools are used in Plugin Management, Plugin Life Cycle and grading systems making it more convenient for developers to develop applications and integrate them into the EdgeGallery platform.
• Workspace: Developers manage their own Application development process by creating projects or migrating projects. Developers can manage project, app package and test task management.
• Postgres DB: PostgreSQL database version 12.x is being used.
• ATP: application testing platform.

EDGE Node Components:

MEP:

• aPaaS:
  • Defect Detection Service: This is a service to detect the defect when PCB images provided
  • Object Detection Service: This service can be used by developer app for various Object detection for example Bottle detection and count for Retail store inventory.
• PaaS:
  • Vault: Vault is a tool for securely accessing secrets. A secret is anything that you want to tightly control access to, such as API keys, passwords, certificates, and more. Vault provides a unified interface to any secret while providing tight access control and recording a detailed audit log.
  • Cert Management: cert-manager is a native Kubernetes certificate management controller. It can help with issuing certificates from a variety of sources, such as Let’s Encrypt, HashiCorp Vault, Venafi, a simple signing key pair, or self signed. It will ensure certificates are valid and up to date, and attempt to renew certificates at a configured time before expiry.
  • OpenEBS: OpenEBS is a Kubernetes native hyper converged storage solution. OpenEBS consumes the storage (disks, SSDs, cloud volumes, etc) available on the Kubernetes worker nodes to dynamically provision Kubernetes Persistent Volumes.

    OpenEBS can provision different type of Local PV for Stateful Workloads like Cassandra, MongoDB, Elastic, etc that are distributed in nature and have high availability built into them. Depending on the type of storage attached to your Kubernetes worker nodes, you can select from Dynamic Local PV - Hostpath, Device, ZFS or Rawfile.

  • Velero: Velero is an open source tool to safely backup and restore, perform disaster recovery, and migrate Kubernetes cluster resources and persistent volumes.
  • Influx DB: Time Influx DB: Time series data base for user applications data.
  • Prometheus Agent: cAdvisor, NodeExporter
  • Multus: Support secondary interfaces for PODs in case of SFC scenarios and CNFs
• MEP Server:
  • DNS:  The MEP platform provides the domain name resolution services to the applications deployed in the EdgeGallery MEC, which can be utilised by the device applications in UE. MEC platform receives the DNS configurations from the MEC management, which includes the FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name), IP address and related entries. MEC applications can later query or modify the state of these configurations.
  • MEP server: MEP platform services like service registry, discovery, DNS, traffic rules etc.  MEP provides service registration, update, delete, and query related API interfaces. Applications can register, update, delete, and query services through MEP.  The service registry provides visibility of the services available on the MEC server. It uses the concept of loose coupling of services, providing flexibility in application deployment. In addition, the service registry presents service availability (status of the service) together with the related interfaces and versions. It is used by applications to discover and locate the end-points for the services they require, and to publish their own service end-point for other applications to use. The access to the service registry is controlled (authenticated and authorised).
  • Network isolation: Provides separation of control, management and data plane
• AppLCM: LCM controller and K8s/OpenStack plugin.  Handles the application life cycle, where lcmController is mainly communicates with K8s/OpenStack plugin to upload config, remove config, instantiate, terminate,and query an application. It also provides APIs to query mep capabilities and kpi information from prometheus.
• KONG: Provides API gateway functionality along with authentication and authorisation.

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APIs

Please refer the API Documentation link : R5 - API Documentation Enterprise Application on Lightweight 5G Telco Edge (EALTEdge)

Hardware and Software Management

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