Subject: What's happening with the DSC

From: SKENT@FNALV.FNAL.GOV

Submitted: Sat, 28 Oct 1995 17:08:47 -0500 (CDT)

Message number: 12 (previous: 11, next: 13 up: Index)

DSC users,

This note is meant to summarize the current state of the DSC software and
hardware.

==============================================================================
SOFTWARE

The disk directory structure on fnstar was reorganized (for the sake of sanity)
during Oct 9-13.

RCVS now works on fnstar.

Fermilab is upgrading the core DA system for the DSC from V2 to V3.  The
new version will provide a common core for all SDSS systems as well.
Many incompatibilites are introduced, so the DOP product must be upgraded
as well.  In order to bridge the transition time (the next few months),
both the old and new versions of the DA system will be available.
Switching between the two requires performing several steps, which will be
described below.

The old system consists of the following products and version numbers:

astroda:	x2_0_0
dop:		v2_2

There are additional products for the VME system that are not directly
seen by the user.

There is now a cut version of the dop product (v2_2).  This
product is slightly modified from the "devel" version that has been used
previously.  The modifications include: a) Documentation updates; b) Renaming
of default directories [bad!] necessitated by the disk reorganization.
When you set up v2_2, the environment variable WWW_HOME now points to
the dsc home page.  This version is known to have certain limitations that
are supposed to be solved by V3 of the DA.

The dop module in the RCVS code repository has been upgraded to match the
cut versions of dop.  There is now a main trunk and a branch.  The branch
contains code that works with V2 of the DA system.  The cut product
v2_2 is tagged on this branch.  It is expected that the branch will
eventually dead-end.  The main trunk will contain dop code for V3 of the DA
system.  At present it is not ready for prime time.  If you want to check
out the branch, do "setup sdssrcvs; cvs co dop v2_2".

Jim Annis is working on making DOP work with V3 of the DA.  Please do
not commit new code to the main trunk of DOP while this work is in progress.

Private versions of dop should continue to work with V2.  The goal in the
future is to eliminate the proliferation of such copies.

==============================================================================
HARDWARE:

It is planned to return DSC dewar and electronics to Fermilab soon for
work to solve some problems with contamination inside the dewar and to
attempt to reduce the noise problems.

=============================================================================
=======		 Reverting to V2 of the DA			=============
=============================================================================
Here is the procedure to use the old version of the DA.  Procedures for
using the new DA will be posted later.

Log in to the dsc account on fnstar.

The following commands reset some logical file links.  They need be run only
if someone has set them up for the V3 DA.  One reset, they are not affected
by system reboot or setting up products.

***	NOTE!!!! File permissions are not properly set at present to permit the
***	dsc user to reset the file links.  You must be root or Ron Rechenmacher

	fnstar% cd /p/astrobase
	fnstar% rm vxworks
	fnstar% ln -s /p/vx_dsc/v5_1_1 vxworks
	fnstar% cd /p/astrobase/node
	fnstar% rm fndscicc
	fnstar% ln -s /p/astrobase/system/dsc fndscicc

Reboot the VME system as follows:

	fnstar% cu -l /dev/ttyd4
	Connected

Type the following line:

	sysReset 1

You will see this output (about 15 seconds worth)


                            VxWorks System Boot

[... lots of stuff deleted] 

	fndscicc> delayTaskPrioritySet: Changed task tShell to priority 10
	task spawned: id = 0x345d08, name = t5

Once the output has stopped, type:

	~.

This will exit from the VME system.


	fnstar% setup dop v2_2
	fnstar% dscRun dsc

Proceed with the normal startup procedure.


Steve Kent
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