When dozens of sensors are present in the smart device and data rationalization at the source is required to push only the necessary data to the backend infrastructure, the ability to do entity abstraction in the control domain becomes one of the evaluation criteria. Sometimes, semantic representations are used to augment the data from the sensors and actuators.

Modeling refers to the ability to perform analysis of data within the control domain. This is sometimes referred to as pushing computational capabilities to the edge in an IIoT implementation.

These capabilities might be programmed into smart edge devices or into the field gateways where there is enough processing power, memory, and storage provided. Software development kits (SDKs) are typically available to enable these tasks and extend the management and servicing capabilities in the control domain.