A Composite is a piece of equipment that contains a network of Devices. All of these Devices are internal to the Composite and can be accessed by other Devices within the Composite. Some of these Devices are also visible on an external network and have one or more Applications that need to be provisioned. Composites are an abstraction on a network and can only be physically accessed via one or more of the externally visible Devices.

A Machine is a common example of a Composite.

A Device which is visible on an external network may have an LDevID Certificate (see 802.1AR) created by the CompositeBuilder that can be used to prove the Device belongs to the Composite.

The CompositeInstanceUri is an identifier for the Composite assigned by the CompositeBuilder. All Devices in the same Composite shall have the same CompositeInstanceUri. The CompositeInstanceUri follows the same rules as ProductInstanceUri (see 5.2).

The subjectAltName is an array of alternate names for the Device. Each entry in the subjectAltName has a datatype and a value. An IDevID and LDevID shall have at least one URI name which is the ProductInstanceUri. LDevIDs created for a Composite shall have at least two URI names, the ProductInstanceUri and the CompositeInstanceUri. If a Device is in a Composite that is contained by another Composite, then only the outermost CompositeInstanceUri is present.

Note that the subjectAltName is a generic field that contains names used for purposes outside the scope of this specification. The URI names with the CompositeInstanceUri and ProductInstanceUri are identified by finding a Ticket that contains the values. URI names that cannot be matched to a Ticket are ignored.

Composites may contain other Composites and Devices. The contained Composite may be externally visible outside of the container Composite. In these scenarios, the CompositeBuilder may treat the contained Composites as Devices and add additional LDevID Certificates that identify the Devices as a component of the container Composite.

The additional LDevID Certificate has the Device ProductInstanceUri and the CompositeInstanceUri for the containing Composite.

The CompositeBuilder is responsible for installing and setup all Devices so they can interact with each other before the Composite is delivered.

When a Composite is connected to an external network it may be necessary to install and re-provision some of the Applications on each externally visible Device. This requires that additional Trust Lists be provided and new Certificates be issued to the Applications. CompositeBuilders may limit access to Applications running on the Devices and/or prevent management Applications on the external network from installing new Applications.

Each Client or Server on a network has a unique ApplicationUri. An ApplicationUri chosen by the CompositeBuilder may not be appropriate when the Composite is connected to the external network. For this reason, all externally visible Applications shall create their default ApplicationUri derived from the Device ProductInstanceUri which is specified in the subjectAltName field of the DeviceIdentity Certificate.