Pci To Camac Executive Crate Connection

TRIUMF's Central Control System has a large investment in CAMAC. To protect this investment but allow the current trend of PCI-bus based computers to be supported, TRIUMF has configured a PCI to CAMAC system. In this setup, TRIUMF has connected PCI based computers into the CAMAC equipment of their Central Control System. DEC Alpha computers running OpenVMS have been interfaced via the PCI bus to the existing CAMAC executive crates. The PCI bus is connected to a Q-bus expansion chassis using a commercial interface and then from the Q-bus chassis to CAMAC via a TRIUMF interface. This paper describes the hardware and software interfaces, and performance issues. 1 INTRODUCTION The TRIUMF central control system consists of several CAMAC[1] highway systems (Figure 1). Each is based on a GEC executive crate system[2] which allows multiple hosts, until recently only VAXes and old Data General Novas, to address any of the serial or parallel branches in the system. A pair of TRIUMF designed e..

Event Handling in TRIUMF's Central Control System

In TRIUMF' s Central Control System (CCS), alarm handling and other types of events are dealt with in a software " scan" package. Many changes that must be monitored are not considered as alarms because there is no action associated with the various values of the control variable and thus the software package was named to reflect the action of scanning the system for defined state changes. This scan package can issue messages to different logs and take actions as determined by the user. The initial requirements, design, implementation, and user interface are described. 1 Introduction During the upgrade of TRIUMF' s central control system, it became apparent that there is a significant amount of process monitoring and alarm handling that could be controlled and operated on by a single software package. Many of the items that are monitored just report state changes or significant magnitude changes to the operators. Some items can cause beam interlocks and others change channel settings..

Update On The Triumf Central Control System

The continuing evolution of the TRIUMF Central Control System is currently subject to three major influences. Most imperative is the need to replace the obsolete Nova computers that still handle much of the routine cyclotron operation. Smooth integration of a number of isolated control systems into the CCS is another focus. The third major force arises from the requirements of developing new projects in a system that has reached serious expansion constraints. The plan for phasing out the Novas, integrating the orphaned systems and allowing expansion of the CCS in a smooth fashion is discussed. This is a conservative approach, relying on the strengths of the present hardware configuration, the substantial financial investment in existing equipment, and the expertise of available personnel, while meeting the present and future requirements. Details of the modified and expanded hardware configuration are described. This review also briefly mentions new support for device access, X-window ..