Overview
IEC TR 63246-4:2022 defines the Configurable Car Infotainment Services (CCIS) protocol. This technical report is Part 4 of the IEC 63246 series and provides informative guidance on the protocol messages, parameters and procedures that protocol entities perform. It is intended to help implementers design and integrate the CCIS protocol in in‑vehicle infotainment and automotive multimedia systems. The document is informative (not normative) and complements other parts of the CCIS series.
Key Topics and Technical Content
The report focuses on the protocol-level building blocks for CCIS and includes:
- Message structure and fields - description of CCIS message format and constituent fields such as version, message type, payload length, sequence number, cookie, and payload.
- Message type decomposition - format of the message type field specifying service, class and operation.
- Services and use cases - documented services include authority & certification, client registration, device registration, device monitoring, device control, content delivery, and broadcasting.
- Parameters - lists of parameters for key messages (e.g., certification information, registration requests/responses, status reports, control and content delivery messages).
- Procedures and state machines - procedural guidance and state transition diagrams for CCIS entities: users, devices, and the CCIS master (initialization, registration, monitoring, control, content delivery).
- Figures and tables - protocol stack, message format diagrams, state transition figures, and tables mapping messages to parameters for easy reference.
Practical Applications
IEC TR 63246-4 is practical for organizations implementing or integrating vehicle infotainment protocols:
- Design and implementation of in‑vehicle infotainment (IVI) communication layers.
- Development of middleware and protocol stacks for vehicle multimedia systems.
- Defining message formats and procedures for device registration, remote control, status monitoring, and content delivery within the vehicle network.
- Informing test cases and interoperability testing in validation labs.
Who Should Use This Standard
- Automotive OEM architects and system integrators
- Tier‑1 suppliers of infotainment hardware and software
- Firmware and protocol engineers implementing CCIS stacks
- Test & validation engineers and interoperability labs
- Security teams assessing protocol flows (authority & certification procedures)
Related Standards
- Other parts of the IEC 63246 series (see IEC webstore for the complete set) and general IEC/ISO guidance referenced in the report. For implementation projects, consult the full CCIS series and relevant automotive communication standards to ensure system alignment.
Keywords: Configurable car infotainment services, CCIS protocol, IEC TR 63246-4, in-vehicle infotainment, protocol messages, device registration, content delivery, device control.