1. A networked sensor system comprises: an upper tier of server devices, the server devices comprising: processor devices; and memory in communication with the processor devices; a middle tier of gateway devices that are in communication with one or more of the upper tier server devices; a lower level tier of devices that comprise fully functional sensor nodes with at least some of the fully functional sensor nodes including an application layer that executes routines to provide node sensor functions and an application layer manager to manage the application layer in the at least some of the functional nodes in the lower tier of devices, with the application layer manager, configured to: manage changes in functions in respective ones of the at least some of the functional nodes in the lower tier; characterize inputs to the respective ones of the at least some of the functional nodes; and apply rules to determine changes in one or more of configuration, stored data and message generation by the respective ones of the at least some of the functional nodes.