Patent ID: 7831694

Claim:
A method of auto-discovering information associated with devices arranged in a monitoring system that monitors measurable quantities of a utility, comprising: receiving configuration information from a local computer in the monitoring system at a server, the local computer attempting to send a data packet associated with a device to the server, the device measuring a characteristic of the utility and storing data indicative of the measured characteristic, the data packet including the data and identification information, the configuration information including at least information indicative of a type of the device and topic information indicative of a type of the data in the data packet, the identification information including a unique device identification (ID) associated with the device, a publisher ID indicating an identity of which local computer is attempting to send the data packet, and an originator ID indicating an identity of an installation in which the device is installed; determining from the configuration information whether the local computer is approved to have the data packet accepted by the server, the determining including comparing the configuration information against system configuration stored in the server; responsive to the comparing, throwing from the server to the local computer an exception that includes an error code indicating that the configuration information or the identification information in the data packet includes information not recognized by the server; responsive to the determining, if the local computer is approved, determining whether the device is approved to have the data packet accepted by the server; responsive to the determining, if the local computer is not approved because the configuration information is not recognized by the server, automatically approving the local computer by updating the system configuration with the configuration information; responsive to the determining, if the local computer is not approved because the identification information in the data packet is not recognized by the server, learning the identification information by storing the identification information in the server such that subsequent data packets associated with the device sent from the local computer to the server will be recognized as having been sent from the device; and responsive to the determining, if the local computer is approved and the device is approved to have the data packet accepted by the server, storing in the server the data packet.