How to Transfer Data from MQTT to Azure IoT Hub

Open Automation Software can be used to transfer data from a MQTT broker to Azure IoT Hub, locally or over a network. This guide walks you through downloading and installing OAS, configuring a MQTT connector, a tag and an Azure IoT Hub publisher, and finally publishing the tag using the Azure IoT Hub publisher.

For this guide on how to transfer data from an MQTT source to Azure IoT Hub you will need:

• To install MQTT Explorer or a similar tool for publishing messages to an MQTT broker
• An Azure account with access to the Azure console

1 - Download and Install OAS

If you have not already done so, you will need to download and install the OAS platform.

Fully functional trial versions of the software are available for Windows, Windows IoT Core, Linux, Raspberry Pi and Docker on our downloads page.

On Windows, run the downloaded setup.exe file to install the Open Automation Software platform. For a default installation, Agree to the End User License Agreement and then click the Next button on each of the installation steps until it has completed.

If you'd like to customize your installation or learn more, use the following instructions:

• Windows Installation
• Linux Installation
• Raspberry Pi Installation
• Docker Installation

The OAS Service Control application will appear when the installation finishes on Windows.

Click on each START SERVICE button to start each of the three OAS services.

2 - Configure OAS

Web Configuration Application

Configuration of the OAS server is performed from the built-in Web Configuration Application. This is the main application for accessing any settings within the OAS server and is completely self-contained within the server.

You can reach this by opening your browser to:

http://<your server>:58725/app/config

If you are browsing from the OAS machine itself, you can use localhost, otherwise use the IP address of the machine. You will also need to ensure port 58725 is open on both the client and the server or you may not be able to reach the application.

On a new installation the OAS engine has no accounts yet, so the first screen you see is Create Admin Account. Once the administrator account exists that screen is not shown again, and browsing to the application displays the sign in screen instead.

1. Enter a name for the administrator in the Admin user name field. Typically you would use admin, but you can use whatever name you choose.

2. Enter a password in the Password field, then enter the same password again in the Confirm password field.

3. Click on the Create admin & sign in button. The account is created and you are signed in to the engine.

To sign in from then on, enter the Network node of the OAS engine, then the Username and Password of your account, and click on the Sign in button.

Legacy Configuration Application

1. From your operating system start menu, open the Configure OAS application.

2. Select the Configure > Tags screen.

   Important

   If this is the first time you have installed OAS, the AdminCreate utility will run when you select a screen in the Configure menu. This will ask you to create a username and password for the admin user. This user will have full permissions in the OAS platform.

   For further information see Getting Started - Security.

3. If this is the first time you are logging in, you will see the AdminCreate utility. Follow the prompts to set up your admin account. Otherwise, select the Log In menu button and provide the Network Node, username and password.

   

   

3 - Configure MQTT Data Source Connector

In the following steps you will create and configure a MQTT Connector to connect to a third party broker so that tags will be able to subscribe to a topic. For the purposes of this guide, you will connect to the public HiveMQ broker.

1. Select Drivers in the sidebar.

2. Click + Add, enter a meaningful Driver Interface Name to give this driver interface instance a unique name, and click Create. Once created, the driver interface name should appear in the list of drivers.

3. Ensure the following parameters are configured:

   • Driver: MQTT
   • IP Address: broker.hivemq.com
   • Port: 1883
   • Client ID: OAS_Client_123

   

   The app flags the empty User Name and Password fields. The public HiveMQ broker accepts anonymous connections, so leave them blank here. Fill them in if the broker you are connecting to requires authentication.

   Tips

   If you are having trouble reading a value in later steps, try to change the Client ID to something else as each client ID connecting to the broker must be unique.

4. Turn on Enable and click on the Apply changes button. The driver interface is not active until it is enabled and the changes are applied.

   

4 - Add Tags

In this step you will add two tags. One tag to represent a JSON payload coming from an external data source and a second Tag to represent the sensor value.

1. Select Tags in the sidebar.

2. If you want to add a Tag at the root of the tag list, make sure no Tag Group is selected and click on the + button, then choose Add tag.

   

   If you want to add a Tag to a Tag Group, select the Tag Group first and then click on the + button and choose Add tag here.

   You can also add Tag Groups by choosing Add group.

3. Enter TemperatureSensorJSON as the Tag name and click the Create button.

   

4. Repeat the above two steps and add another Tag with the name TemperatureSensor.

   

5 - Assign MQTT as Tag Data Source

You will now set the Tag's data source to the MQTT driver interface that you created previously.

At the end of this section you will need to use a tool like MQTT Explorer to publish a value to your Tag.

1. Select the Tag that will source data from the MQTT data source.

   

2. Set the following properties:

   • Data Type: JSON
   • Data Source: MQTT
   • Select Driver Interface: MQTT Data Source
   • Topic: oas/temperature

   

3. Click on the Apply changes button to apply the changes.

4. Using an MQTT testing tool to publish messages, such as MQTT Explorer, publish a JSON message to the oas/temperature topic.

   {
       "temperature": 24.9
   }
   

   

   

   

5. Check that the quality status is Good and you can see the JSON value.

   

6 - Parse JSON Payload

In this step you will extract the sensor value from the JSON payload using a Calculation Tag and JSON functions.

1. Select the Tag that will represent the temperature value.

   

2. Set the Data Source value to Calculation.

3. Next to the Calculation field click on the Edit… button.

4. In the Edit Calculation window enter the following function.

   JSONQUERY([TemperatureSensorJSON.Value], "$.temperature")
   

   This will extract the temperature field from the TemperatureSensorJSON Tag value.

   Click the OK button to save the calculation.

   

5. Click on the Apply changes button to apply the changes.

6. You should now see the sensor value displayed for the Tag.

7 - Create Azure IoT Hub Resource

In this step you will create a new Azure IoT Hub resource. This creates the necessary IoT broker and management framework.

1. Login to the Azure Console and select the IoT Hub service.

2. Click on the Create button.

3. Select your Subscription and Resource group, then provide an IoT hub name such as OASIoTHub. You can adjust the Region if necessary. For the purposes of this guide you can use the Free tier.

   If you already have an IoT Hub configured you can use that instead.

   

4. Click on the Review + create button and then click on the Create button when you have reviewed the details.

5. It will take a few minutes to create a new IoT Hub resource.

8 - Configure Azure IoT Hub Connector

In the following steps you will create and configure an Azure IoT connector.

The OAS Azure IoT connector can automatically create the device in Azure that represents the OAS connection. For this reason it uses the iothubowner shared access policy.

1. You can obtain the OASIoTHub connection string in the IoT Hub portal. Open the IoT Hub that you created and in the menu select Security Settings > Shared access policies.

   

2. Click on iothubowner to open the key and connection strings panel.

   

3. Next to the Primary connection string click on the copy button.

   

4. Select Drivers in the sidebar.

5. Click + Add, enter a meaningful Driver Interface Name to give this driver interface instance a unique name, and click Create. Once created, the driver interface name should appear in the list of drivers.

6. Ensure the following parameters are configured:

   • Driver: Azure IoT
   • Type: IoT Hub
   • Azure IoT Device ID: OAS
   • Azure IoT Connection: The connection string copied from Step 3
   • Azure IoT Hub: OASIoTHub.azure-devices.net

   

7. Turn on Enable and click on the Apply changes button. The driver interface is not active until it is enabled and the changes are applied.

   

9 - Verify Azure IoT Hub Device

In this section you will verify that a device with the Device ID OAS was created automatically in the Azure IoT Hub.

1. In the Azure IoT Hub portal for the OASIoTHub IoT Hub, select Device management > Devices.

   

2. You should see the device OAS listed in the table.

   

10 - Publish Selected Tags in Azure IoT Hub connector

In this step you will select the Tags that you want to publish to Azure IoT Hub in the Azure IoT connector configuration.

1. In the Drivers screen, select the Azure IoT driver instance that you created in the previous section (for example Azure IoT Connector 1).

2. Make sure the Publish Selected Tags toggle is turned on.

   

3. In the Tags To Publish table click on the Add button.

   

4. The Publish tag window will appear. Click on the … button to browse for a Tag, select the Tag you want to add in the left hand panel and then ensure the Value property is selected, and click on the Use this tag button.

   

5. Back in the Publish tag window the Id defaults to the full Tag path (e.g. TemperatureSensor.Value). If you want to set your own property name, you can change the Id field to your own custom value. Click on the OK button.

   

6. The Tag has now been added to the list. You can add other Tags by repeating steps 3 to 5.

   

7. Click on the Apply changes button.

11 - Verify Messages are Published to Azure IoT Hub

In this step you will confirm that OAS is successfully publishing your selected Tags to the Azure IoT Hub. By default, the publishing type is set to Continuous and the interval is 10 seconds.

1. In the Azure portal open the Cloud Shell in the toolbar.

   

2. Use the following command to start listening for events.

   az iot hub monitor-events --hub-name OASIoTHub --device-id OAS
   

   It may request for installation of the Azure IoT commands

3. You should see a payload printed for each message that is received. This should occur every 10 seconds.

   Starting event monitor, filtering on device: OAS, use ctrl-c to stop...
   {
       "event": {
           "origin": "OAS",
           "module": "",
           "interface": "",
           "component": "",
           "payload": "{\r\n  \"deviceId\": \"OAS\",\r\n  \"values\": [\r\n    {\r\n      \"id\": \"TemperatureSensor\",\r\n      \"value\": \"24.902344\",\r\n      \"quality\": true,\r\n      \"timestamp\": \"2025-05-14T07:52:30.576Z\"\r\n    }\r\n  ]\r\n}"
       }
   }
   

   The data from OAS is contained in the payload field of the JSON structure.

4. To stop monitoring you can press ctrl-c on your keyboard.

12 - Save Changes

Once you have successfully configured your OAS instances, make sure you save your configuration.

On each configuration page that has a Save button, click on it.

If this is the first time you are saving the configuration, or if you are changing the name of the configuration file, OAS will ask you if you want to change the default configuration file.

If you select Yes then OAS will make this configuration file the default and if the OAS service is restarted then this file will be loaded on start-up.

If you select No then OAS will still save your configuration file, but it will not be the default file that is loaded on start-up.