0/8 HyperNews for ATLAS Status and expectations Applications Area meeting, February 1, 2006 Traudl Kozanecki

1/8 HN SLAC -> HN CERN ATLAS: using –Mailing lists (381), Savannah (42 projects), Twiki (1777 pages), CDS agenda system (275 subcategories) BaBar: HN is the main form of communication between collaborators, replacing most of the above Presentation of HN by Amir Farbin: s/w workshop May 2005 –SIT decides to follow up on HN together with CMS Peter Elmer (CMS) –Adapted with the help of SLAC (3 people) the SLAC/HN version –s/w workshop Dec 2005: First version available –Jan 2006: HN in use for CMS (~20 Forums) Peter has done a great job and –still does patiently all the setups for Atlas Categories/Forums (10/17)

2/8 What is HyperNews Threaded conferencing system for the web –Grouped by Category/Forum/thread_of_Postings Each Forum corresponds to a mailing list –Forum Xyz –Generic ATLAS user Atlas.mail is owner of all lists hn-atlas-* Web interface allows to browse postings –Thread-based and easy to use –Searchable (Title, content, …) Password protected –Access control automatic through lxplus login Id (or in exceptional cases: Id and password set by the administrator) CERN supported by IT (Andreas Pfeiffer) –Server and its "mirror" (hourly backup); afs backup of tar files of Forums and configuration

3/8 Features -- a selection Forums –Easy to subscribe and unsubscribe –Search by Forum and past n days –Threaded display with choice of depth Posting a message –Various formats for messages Plain text, HTML, smart text, …, add icons Can use instead –Choose whether to be notified of replies Time ordered display –For forums, or postings per forum –Very useful for keeping up-to-date HN services are accessible from each HN page –in header navigation bar

4/8 Atlas HN - our expectations [1] Relieve Twiki from discussions –Twiki is not for discussions, but for collaborative writing of documentation –Atlas has many Twiki pages, which are better suited for Forums "Wrapper" for SIMBA2 lists –HN is not a replacement of Simba, but an interface to Simba –"Move" at least those lists which are discussions, help, … For atlas-sw-* at least 11 out of 28 lists could be moved –HN: browsable tree of postings, searchable content More efficient handling of Help requests –Now: help mailing list, postings distributed by hand to Savannah

5/8 Expectations [2] Central coordination of information Daily up-to-date information –Easy to search and follow up Thread-based discussions, grouped into Forums Easy formation of small discussion forums Protected environment for physics analysis discussions –Very important aspect, nothing convenient available now –See next slide

6/8 Reviewing physics analysis In BaBar: each analysis has its own Forum –> 50% of Forums are Reviews of analysis topics Communication between –Reviewers and analyzers –Collaboration members and analyzers –Reviewers and publications board Log official approvals for Publications Board Log communications with Journals Note: Review Forums are created only by the convener of the review

7/8 Simba vs HN Simba does not organize lists –Need to search for a list by name –HN allows to browse and search what is of interest to you Can not search content of Simba lists –Easy with HN and the search is fast HN: You do not miss anything if you are not subscribed –It is easy to find recent postings Discussion forum –With HN, you can have a discussion because only interested people will see your s, and it is easy to follow the thread HN is under "our" control –fast response when upgrades are needed

8/8 Hypernews -- summary –could become the central place for recent information in organized form –it should facilitate communication within the collaboration –it is for now the only place for protected analysis discussions leading to publications –BUT: a HyperNews culture will have to be developed. This will hopefully happen with the help of our collaborators coming from BaBar