PISA: The PHENIX Experiment Simulation Package
Paper: 335
Session: A (talk)
Speaker: Maguire, Charles, Vanderbilt University, Nashville
Keywords: code management, mixed language programming, simulation, large systems, world-wide collaboration
PISA: The PHENIX Experiment Simulation Package
Charles F. Maguire
Anita Trivedi
Andrew Rose
Warren Davidison
S. Victoria Greene
Timothy Miller
Ajit Mohanty
Phool Chand
S.S. Kapoor
R.K. Choudhury
Li Qun
Vanderbilt University, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (Bombay)
Institute for High Energy Physics (Beijing), and
PHENIX Collaboration
The PHENIX detector at the RHIC accelerator is a huge, extremely complex
experimental device whose physics goals can only be realized with the aid of a
sophisticated simulation tool. The PISA (PHENIX Integrated Simulation
Application) package now comprises over 1.6 million lines of software and
associated documentation and is in active use worldwide by scores of detector
subsystem programmers among this international collaboration. The simulation
software models the ensemble performance of a dozen different detector
technologies aimed at unraveling rare signal events in an excruciatingly dense
background. So far the simulation program has assisted the collaboration
physicists in the development of tracking pattern recognition algorithms,
multi-level trigger strategies, hardware and software optimizations for
background rejection, and Day 1 physics data acquisition planning. On a
technical level, the four year software building process has pushed
the capabilities of code development, management, and distribution on a
multinational basis. For additional information please access our Web site at:
http://rhinuc.phy.vanderbilt.edu/siml.html