David Berg

Pan-da And Beyond Data Acquisition For the Next Generation Experiments

We report on the status of the PAN-DA data acquisition system presented at the last Real Time Conference. Since that time, PAN-DA has been successfully used in the fixed target program at Fermilab. We also report on the plans and strategies for development of a new data acquisition system for the next generation of fixed target experiments at Fermilab. 10 refs., 3 figs.

A real time integrated environment for Motorola 680xx-based VME and FASTBUS modules

The Software Components Group pSOS operating system kernel and pROBE debugger have been extended to support the Fermilab PAN-DA data acquisition system for a variety of Motorola 680xx-based VME and FASTBUS modules. These extensions include: a multitasking, reentrant implementation of Microtec C/Pascal; a serial port driver for terminal I/O and data transfer; a message reporting facility; and enhanced debugging tools. An overview of the system is given, and the run-time-library reentrancy and process context, the serial port driver, the SYS68K Message Reporter System subroutine package, and the enhanced debugging tools are discussed. >

The PAN-DA data acquisition system

The VAXONLINE data acquisition package has been extended to include a VME-based data path. The resulting environment, PAN-DA, provides a high throughput for logging, filtering, formatting, and selecting events. The authors describe the history and rationale of the system, the VME hardware modules, PAN-DA systems coordination, and system connectivity. >

A High-Speed CAMAC Data Acquisition System for PDP-11

This paper describes a high-speed data acquisition system for a PDP-11 running under the RSX-11M operating system. It has been used by several high-energy physics experiments at Fermilab. The system consists of several coordinated tasks which acquire data through a CAMAC interface, log data to magnetic tape, supply data to independent monitoring and analysis tasks (such as RSXMULTI), and perform control functions. A data buffer extending beyond the 18-bit address space of the PDP-11 is implemented using Konelar bank-switchable memory. Supported configurations range from small systems with single data acquisition and analysis tasks on the same processor, to large multi-processor systems with data acquisition on several PDPs and analysis on separate PDPs or VAXs.

Fermilab's multi-petabyte scalable mass storage system

Fermilab provides a multi-petabyte scale mass storage system for high energy physics (HEP) experiments and other scientific endeavors. We describe the scalability aspects of the hardware and software architecture that were designed into the mass storage system to permit us to scale to multiple petabytes of storage capacity, manage tens of terabytes per day in data transfers, support hundreds of users, and maintain data integrity. We discuss in detail how we scale the system over time to meet the ever-increasing needs of the scientific community, and relate our experiences with many of the technical and economic issues related to scaling the system. Since the 2003 MSST conference, the experiments at Fermilab have generated more than 1.9 PB of additional data. We present results on how this system has scaled and performed for the Fermilab CDF and D0 Run II experiments as well as other HEP experiments and scientific endeavors.

Software for the Fermilab FASTBUS Smart Crate Controller

We report on software developed in support of the Fermilab FASTBUS Smart Crate Controller. This software includes a full suite of diagnostics, support for FASTBUS Standard Routines, and extended software to allow communication over the RS-232 and Ethernet ports. The communication software supports remote procedure call execution from a host VAX or Unix system. The software supported on the FSCC forms part of the PAN-DA software system which supports the functions of front end readout controllers and event builders in multiprocessor, multilevel. distributed data acquisition systems.

Version 2 of RSXMULTI

MULTI is a general purpose, high speed, high energy physics interface to data acquisition and data investigation system that runs on PDP-11 and VAX architecture. This paper describes the latest version of MULTI, which runs under RSX-11M version 4.1 and supports a modular approach to the separate tasks that interface to it, allowing the same system to be used in single CPU test beam experiments as well as multiple interconnected CPU, large scale experiments. MULTI uses CAMAC (IEE-583) for control and monitoring of an experiment, and is written in FORTRAN-77 and assembler. The design of this version, which simplified the interface between tasks, and eliminated the need for a hard to maintain homegrown I/O system is also discussed.

Uniform Remote Control of Front End Processors in PAN-DA

Abstract The PAN-DA data acquisition software system encompasses support for a variety of front end processors including the Struck General Purpose Master (GPM), the Fermilab Smart Crate Controller (FSCC), and the Motorola MVME133-A VME single board computer. PAN- DA provides support for the remote control of these processors through its Remote Procedure execution (RPX) software. This software runs over serial lines, and in some PAN-DA environments, over the Ethernet and TCP/lP as well. Experiments E791 and E771 have successfully used RPX software in both FSCC software development and data collection during the 1990-1991 fixed target run at Fermilab. RPX software has facilitated development and testing of the Fermilab Silicon Strip Detector readout system, for which the FSCC is an integral component, RPX based control and monitoring of the GPM and the MVME133-A are essential parts of the PANDA data acquisition system used by E687 and E773 during the 1990.1991 run. I. INTRODUCTION Although a greater amount of intelligence is finding its way into front end processors, because of their dedicated task and real time requirements, they will always lack the full functionality of general purpose computers. Because of this, central control is usually provided by more appropriate general purpose computers. This paper discusses the software provided for controlling PAN-DA Il.21 front end processors from remote hosts. This software provides a uniform high level interface through remote procedure calls for a variety of front end processors, and a variety of other levels of communications mechanisms depending on the spccilic front end processor. Two specilic applications of the control software are presented: The PAN- DA data acquisition control and remote control of FSCCs. 1 Sponsored by DOE contracl No. DE-AC02-76CH03000 II. SYSTEM LEVEL SOFTWARE The communications software uses Software Components Group’s operating system, pSOS, and was developed with their pROBE board level debugger. The software and device drivers are developed on VAXes “sing cross tools from Microtec3, Inc., including C and Pascal compilers, assembler, librarian, and linker. Source code and product management ate also handled on the VAX. The Microtcc Run Time Library, which supports both C and Pascal, has been slightly modified to provide the process teennancy necessary for multitasking. Our embedded systems environment is supported on 68000 based processors, and has bee” ported to all PAN-DA front end processors discussed here. It integrates the operating system, the board hardware, the Run Time Library and other high level language support, utility libraries, a serial port driver, and drivers for other processor peripherals. The serial ports are accessible by standard language l/O consnwts. System PROMS provided with the FSCC [3,4] include a” Ethernet downloader called DETH [41. DETH comes up automatically when the board is reset, and listens for download requests from VAX hosts. Applications can be started automatically when downloaded by DETH, or at a later time. The MVME133-A can be downloaded over the in-house vertical bus (Branch Bus) or RS-232. The GPM can be downloaded only over RS-232. The embedded environment also provides the capability to boot applications from ROM, or other non volatile memories, by copying into RAM, or running directly out of ROM. III. COMMUNICATIONS SOFIWARE Supported front end processors are able to communicate with the outside world over RS-232, Ethernet, or both. The software we have layered on top of these two media is depicted in Figure 1. 2pSOS and pROBE are trademarks of Software Components Group, Inc. 3Microtec is a registered trademark of Microtec Research,