1. Star Online System
Claude A. Pruneau, Mei-li Chen, Adam Kisiel, and Jeff Porter
CHEP 2000, Padova, Italy.

2. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Project Goals
Design, implement, and deploy hardware and software for STAR experiment control.
Develop a system which is powerful, robust, and flexible, yet easy to maintain, and to use.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

3. Description – Online Scope
Star subsystem configuration and control.
Run configuration and control.
Run and subsystem (hardware) monitoring.
Raw data, and full event reconstruction for monitoring of the detector performance.
Quality Assurance (QA) to insure maximum and uniform quality of data.
FOR MORE INFO...
Star Online Web-site :
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

4. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Technology
Hardware:
Various computer platforms and architectures including windows NT, SUN Solaris, LINUX.
Computing languages:
C++ used for core components.
Java 1.2 AWT/SWING used for graphical user interface (GUI).
Shell scripts and PERL used for top level maintenance and scripting; custom make files for application build.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

5. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Technology (Cont’d)
Computing tools and packages:
C++ rogue wave STL, threads libraries.
Inter-process communication with CORBA.
Selected ORB: Orbacus.
Formerly using Orbix (Iona technology inc).
ASCII data representation and storage with XML.
mySQL database for long term data storage and archival.
ROOT for command scripting and data analysis.
Nexus (customed application) for GUI.
CVS used for code archival.
Jbuilder3 professional for GUI development.
Documentation system web based.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

6. Development Team and Contributors
Core team:
Claude A Pruneau (group leader), Jeff porter (database group leader), Mei-li Chen, Adam Kisiel.
Mark Gilkes, Nathan Stone, Konstantin Olchansky, Torre Wenaus.
Other contributors:
Jeff Landgraff (DAQ), Jack Engelage (TRG), Sergei Panitkin (TPC), Marcelo Munhoz (SVT), Kathy turner (QA).
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

7. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
System Overview
C++ CORBA servers used as control components.
GUI clients : NEXUS.
CLI clients : ROOT.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

8. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Online Domains
Abstract partition of LAN.
Enables:
Multiple concurrent instances of the system on the same network.
Simple concurrent use, debugging, and development of the system without cross-interference.
Implementation:
Based on CORBA server naming scheme: “domainName_serverName”.
Deployed:
OnlStar, OnlDebug, OnlTest(n), n=1, 2, …, 5.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

9. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Security
Established with custom password system.
Domain wide password grants “read” privilege to all data.
Server specific password grants “read/write” access to specific server.
Individual password to grant “cookie” carrying passwords for domains, and servers to which user is granted access by “management”.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

10. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Servers
Run Server
Subsystem Servers
Message Server
Event Pool Servers
Run Number Server
Beam Parameter Server
mySQL Database Servers
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

11. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Run Server
Unloaded
Disabled
Enabled
Ready
Running
Paused
Pause
Resume
End
Deconfigure
Release
Unload
Begin
Configure
Reserve
Load
Run state control
with simple state machine
Run configuration
dynamically loaded/unloaded from mySQL db.
consists of “keys” to subsystem configurations.
Concurrent run servers
multiple/simultaneous runs
External/User Control with CORBA interface
ROOT/C++ API, NeXus/JAVA API , Subsystem components/C++ API
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

12. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Subsystem Servers
Subsystem state control
with vector state machine
Subsystem configuration
dynamically loaded/unloaded
consists of data objects loaded from mySQL db.
Tuning “on the fly”
External/User Control with CORBA interface
ROOT/C++ API, NeXus/JAVA API
Key 0
Configuration 0
State n
Key 1
Configuration 1
Key n
Configuration n
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

13. Run/Subsystem Configuration
run parameters
subsystem parameters
Database
mySQL database
C++ API, JAVA API
contains:
configurations
configuration catalog
Configuration catalog
one for run configurations
one per subsystem
organization (within the mySQL db) of configurations in a “file/folder-system” scheme.
“user-defined” classification of the run/subsystem configurations
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

14. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Configurations
Implementation in IDL, for consistent use in C++ and JAVA through a well defined interface. - Document Object Model (DOM) aware.
Implementation in mySQL as data tables (rows) and relational tables to effectively mimic a tree structure.
Table Row/Rows
Configuration
Table Row/Rows
Folder
Table Row/Rows
Folder
Table Row/Rows
Folder
Table Row/Rows
Table Row/Rows
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

15. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Event Pool
Goals:
Online analysis of Star data for commissioning, debugging, and QA.
Sample up to 10% of the bandwidth from DAQ to RCF - event rate ~ 100 mHz.
Technology
Data transfer from DAQ Event builder to Online file server using Myrinet network connection.
SUN 450/Solaris file server, with 200 GBytes of disk.
Software Architecture
Request
Manager
EVB
Client
Client
Client
Event
Receiver
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

16. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Online QA
Goal :
Insure maximum and uniform data quality from all Star subsystems.
Tools:
Pad monitor
Event Display
Subsystem + Global Analysis programs based on Offline analysis software and any additional software required online - use ROOT as the analysis environment.
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

17. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Online QA
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

18. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
NeXus
Designed to provide for full control of the Star Online system.
Implemented in JAVA 2.0, with use of AWT, and SWING.
Use Visibroker CORBA API for communication with servers.
Consists of:
GUI shell
Application/server client modules
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

19. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
NeXus
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000

20. Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000
Summary
System partially completed.
Many components to be added, e.g.
Detector configuration/servers
Detector conditions
Run log, Scaler log.
NeXus future developments
mySQL db browser
dynamic load of classes
dynamic scripts
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Star Online System - C. A. Pruneau - CHEP 2000