The OPC Unified architecture multipart standard describes a number of Services and a variety of information models. These Services and information models can be referred to as features of a Server or Client. Servers and Clients need to be able to describe which features they support and wish to have certified. This document provides a grouping of these features. The individual features are grouped into ConformanceUnits which are further grouped into Profiles. Figure 1 provides an overview of the interactions between Profiles, ConformanceUnits and TestCases. The large arrows indicate the components that are used to construct the parent. For example a Profile is constructed from Profiles and ConformanceUnits. The figure also illustrates a feature of the OPC UA Compliance Test Tool (CTT), in that it will test if a requested Profile passes all ConformanceUnits. It will also test all other ConformanceUnits and report any other Profiles that pass conformance testing. The individual TestCases are defined in separate documents see Compliance Part 8 UA Server and Compliance Part 9 UA Client. The TestCases are related back to the appropriate ConformanceUnits defined in this standard. This relationship is also displayed by the OPC UA Compliance Test Tool.

Figure 1 – Profile – ConformanceUnit – TestCases

Each ConformanceUnit represents a specific set of features (e.g. a group of services, portions of services or information models) that can be tested as a single entity. ConformanceUnits are the building blocks of a Profile. Each ConformanceUnit can also be used as a test category. For each ConformanceUnit, there would be a number of TestCases that test the functionality described by the ConformanceUnit. The description of a ConformanceUnit is intended to provide enough information to illustrate the required functionality, but in many cases to obtain a complete understanding of the ConformanceUnit the reader may be required to also examine the appropriate part of OPC UA. Additional Information regarding testing of a ConformanceUnit are provided in the Compliance Part 8 UA Server or Compliance Part 9 UA Client test standards.

The same features do not appear in more than one ConformanceUnit.

A Profile is a named aggregation of ConformanceUnits and other Profiles. To support a Profile, an application has to support the ConformanceUnits and all aggregated Profiles. The definition of Profiles is an ongoing activity, in that it is expected that new Profiles will be added in the future.

An OPC UA Application will typically support multiple Profiles.

Multiple Profiles may include the same ConformanceUnit.

Testing of a Profile consists of testing the individual ConformanceUnits that comprise the Profile.

Profiles are named based on naming conventions (see 6.3 for details).

Profiles are grouped into categories to help vendors and end users understand the applicability of a Profile. A Profile can be assigned to more than one category.

Table 1 – Profile Categories contains the list of currently defined ProfileCategories.

Table 1 – Profile Categories

Category	Description
Client	Profiles of this category specify functions of an OPC UA Client.
Global Directory Service	Profiles of this category specify functions for global discovery and certificate management.
Security	Profiles of this category specify security related functions. Security policies are part of this category. The URI of security policies has to be part of an Endpoint Description returned from the GetEndpoints service. Profiles of this category apply to Clients and Servers.
Server	Profiles of this category specify functions of an OPC UA Server. The URI of such Profiles can be exposed in the Server capabilities.
Transport	Profiles of this category specify specific protocol mappings. The URI of such Profiles has to be part of an Endpoint Description. These Profiles apply to Clients and Servers.