The Fermilab DART Data Acquistion at running experiments

Paper: 349
Session: B (talk)
Speaker: Oleynik, Gene, Fermilab, Batavia
Keywords: data acquisition systems, data presentation, graphics, monitoring systems, software tools


The Fermilab DART Data Acquistion at running experiments

Gene Oleynik, for the DART collaboration:
Online Systems Department, Electronics Systems Engineering,
E781, E815, E831, KTeV, E835, E871, E872

The full DART system has been running since June, when the first beam

was delivered to FT program. We report on the completion of the DART
system, experiences at the experiments, and plans for the future. We
concentrate on those portions of DART that were completed towards the
end of the development, in particular our graphical monitoring
system, damp, which is of general use.

The DART data acquisitions system is designed to meet the needs of
a number of experiments with a wide range of requirements: from
a few hundred KB/s at low rates to one of the highest rate HEP
data acquistion systems in operation - KTeV. What stands out in
DART is its fully distributed nature, its high degree of
tailorability, and its wide range of readout rates and throughput,
while at the same time maintaining high levels of integration.
The system has been described in previous papers []; we report on
status of DART at the experiments.

One of the more recently completed and enthusiatically received
pieces of DART is the damp DA monitoring framework. This is a
system that allows distributed applications to provide dynamic
statistics for DISPLAY through a simple API. The data is collected
and displayed through a tcl/tk graphical program. This program can
display the data as multivariable strip charts, bar charts, or
numeric scalers. A damp interface builder lets one construct
customized displays and their associated data graphically in a
matter of minutes.

We also review experiences gained from use at running experiments
and extensions to DART that are under development for the future.