Paper |
Title |
Page |
PM23 |
Networked Attached Devices at SNS
|
146 |
|
- W. Blokland, T.J. Shea
ORNL, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA
- M. Stettler
LANL, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, USA
|
|
|
The Spallation Neutron Source (SNS) diagnostic instruments at Oak Ridge
National Laboratory are based on the Network Attached Device (NAD)
concept. Each pickup or sensor has its own resources such as timing, data
acquisition and processing. NADs are individually connected to the
network, thus reducing the brittleness inherent in tightly coupled
systems. This architecture allows an individual device to fail or to be
serviced or removed without disrupting other devices.
This paper describes our implementation of the nearly 400 NADs to be
deployed. The hardware consists of rack-mounted PCs with standard
motherboards and PCI data-acquisition boards. The software environment is
based on LabVIEW and EPICS. LabVIEW supports the agile development
demanded by modern diagnostic systems. EPICS is the control system
standard for the entire SNS facility. To achieve high performance,
LabVIEW and EPICS communicate through shared memory.
SNS diagnostics are developed by a multi-laboratory partnership including
ORNL, BNL, LANL, and LBNL. The NAD concept proved successful during the
commissioning of the SNS front-end both at LBNL and ORNL.
|
|