We’re excited to introduce the Release Candidate for Profile M, a draft specification that standardizes the communication of metadata and event handling of analytics for smart applications. This new Release Candidate will continue ONVIF’s relevancy in the market, as it paves the way for increased interoperability of IP cameras or analytics applications with VMS systems – as well as seamless integration with IoT systems. 

What is Profile M and who will benefit?
The main function of Profile M is to provide a standard way of communicating metadata between these edge devices, such as IP cameras or analytic apps for devices, and clients – such as VMS, network video recorders or server, or cloud-based services. This is beneficial to systems integrators and end users looking to flexibly mix and match solutions from different providers of analytics, edge devices and video management software or cloud services, together with IoT applications, into one system. 

The Release Candidate supports analytics configuration and information query for metadata – including the filtering and streaming of metadata. Additionally, it features interfaces for generic object classification and specified metadata for geolocation, vehicle, license plate, human face and human body. Profile M also defines interfaces for rule configuration for events, event handling for apps that support people counting, and face and license plate recognition, and events using JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) and the MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport) protocol for IoT applications.

According to Sriram Bhetanabottla, Chair of the ONVIF Profile M Working Group, this profile will be a compelling profile for camera and VMS vendors, as well as independent developers of edge-server-or cloud-based services. “The rise in the number of smart applications for security, business intelligence and IoT devices is driving interoperability demands,” said Bhetanabottla. 

ONVIF expects Profile M apps to have wide compatibility, which will encourage further growth in the quality and quantity of applications available to end users.

Use cases for Profile M and Metadata
The use cases for metadata are vast, including highlighting objects of interest in a video stream, heat mapping in a retail store using human and geolocation metadata and vehicle mapping in a parking lot using vehicle and geolocation metadata. 

For Profile M, use cases include event handling interfaces such as crowd control or queue management through people counting analytics; and access control in a parking lot through license plate recognition apps. For an IoT application, the Profile M event-handling interface can be used for room temperature control, for example, where a Profile M camera detects humans in a room and sends and ONVIF event over MQTT to an IoT Platform or application that, in turn, triggers a smart thermostat to adjust the room temperature.

For more information on Profile M, read the full press release here.