Introduction

This is the first ECS PD newsletter. Hopefully we start putting these out on a monthly basis to take stock of the improvements and work we're doing, and let the rest of LCLS know what new things are available from ECS! Note, even more was done than is listed here. We gave ECS 2 days to fill in highlights, but everyone is super busy and so this is just what we managed to write down. 

Imaging Systems

Fixed server configuration issues that caused the network interface on the camera servers to periodically reset, disrupting data collection and often worse.

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Improperly latching "BPTM timeout" faults have been resolved and will no longer prevent beam seemingly at random.

Gas and Vacuum Systems

Hutch Python

Fixed bugs:

• Fixed lxt_ttc oddities
• Fixed synchronized axis support in general
• Fixed issue where DAQ would disconnect itself after a scan in some scenarios
• Fixed various malformed status printouts
• Fixed malformed metadata from Newport motors and from derived unit conversion signals

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XRT Mirrors M1, M2 and  M3 are now connected to the PMPS arbiter and coating protection is now active.

XRT M1 (

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MR1L3) Upgrade

The goal was to get the old Elmo drives out and install a new Beckhoff din rail drive panel. These panels drive 6 axis, 6 absolute encoders, and interface with an E-621 Piezo Controller. Also, the rail was supplied with a new 24/48 volt din rail power supply that had to be racked and wired, so even the wire job was considerable; shout out to Du, Danh  who did some fine electrical work. On top of these tasks we had to run the software for MR1L2 on a PLC running software for 2 other flat mirrors in the XRT running older Elmo drive software. Other tasks included getting a new IOC spun up, a new control screen, and re pointing older screens to use the updated MR1L2 screens.

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LCLS-II DAQ support has been added for SP1K1's grating pitch! This works up to 120Hz and involves triggering the motion PLC directly to get encoder counts out and sent directly to the DAQ. This can feasibly be re-used to get any values we'd like from the PLC to the DAQ directly. The values are timed into the DAQ using an EVR.

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Grafana, Logging, Alerting

• EPICS Archiver data source now allows for alerting, thanks to an ongoing fruitful collaboration with KEK, the Japanese High Energy Accelerator Research Organization. This has been a promised functionality for years, so we're very excited to finally roll it out.
  • Slack channels have been made for hutches and groups to opt-in to alerts:
    #grafana-alerts-ecs
    #grafana-alerts-cxi
    #grafana-alerts-kfe
    #grafana-alerts-mec
    #grafana-alerts-mfx
    #grafana-alerts-rix
    #grafana-alerts-xcs
    #grafana-alerts-tmo
    #grafana-alerts-xpp
    #grafana-alerts-xrt
    #grafana-alerts-lfe
  • ECS invites users to try this new functionality and report back their results.
  • Instructions to set up alerts can be found here: How to set up EPICS notifications using Grafana.
• A new PLC logging daemon ("ads-log-daemon") was installed to automatically stream logs from any PLC configured on the network.
  • Due to limitations of Beckhoff hardware, the previous configuration did not catch all messages coming from PLCs.
  • This new daemon hooks into the same system that TwinCAT XAE does, and therefore should be able to catch all messages from PLCs - even without a valid TF6310 TCP/IP license installed.
• A beta-level data source was added to log full IOC output in Grafana.
  • The current (stable) data source only accepts EPICS errLog messages, which not all IOC authors may be using.
  • Due to the extreme amount of log messages generated (>100 million per week), some pre-filtering is required, which will take time to perfect.
• EPICS Archiver Appliance statistics are now being tracked and monitored.

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The attenuator AT1K4 was installed and checked out. Coordinating with TMO, individual filter positions were determined and a calculator IOC was deployed to support easy normalized transmission-based operation.

Double3 Robot

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Kaneda, our trusty ears and eyes in the NEH, now roams the halls freely (with supervision). Let the robot revolution commence. Login and access guidance can be found here. More robots following soon in other LCLS areas. Drive safe, have fun!

AR Headsets

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The RealWear HMT-1 AR headset was at last deployed to the field at LCLS. Headsets have been handed out to SEAs in nearly every area of LCLS for initial deployment and training. The headsets are assigned to each hutch, as well as ECS, SED and Technical support. Check in with your local SEA to get instructions on usage!

You can find more information here.

FIM Commissioning

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The first FIM commissioning shift was conducted successfully this month.     Once timed in, we started getting good beam signals on all the wave8 channels.     Tests were done w/ both LCLS1 and LCLS2 timing and some lessons were learned re which registers contribute to the timing delay for LCLS1 vs LCLS2.    There were also some issues w/ firmware or timing signals freezing where we needed to reset the timing.    Will continue to look into this.    We'll also be looking to do some improvements to integrate the FIM screens into TMO home and to provide some FIM specific aliases for Wave8 PVs which are of special significance for the FIM.

makepeds

The newest version of makepeds lives in R1.8.5 of engineering_tools. Changes to prior versions:

• support for the FFB: specify with -F or by specifying a queue in the new FFB (ffb[h/l][1/2/3]q). Please ask your ECS POC which queue is appropriate - this will typically be the same as used for data processing.
• data processing is 'local/no queue' by default. To use the queue, you need to specify '-q <queue>'. We recommend the queue only for epix10k pedestals as this allow for parallel processing, speeding up processing.
• geometry option: '-g <experiment_to_copy_from>' will copy the geometry file from that experiment to the specified one with correct permissions and updating the 'history' as well. You will need to pass a run still so that detectors that need a geometry can be identified. Please note that the Jungfrau detectors also need the offset-files which are not yet included here.

Jira and Issue Reporting

ECS Platform Dev began exploring the use of Jira as our future ticketing system. We developed an embedded form for submitting issues to our Jira backlog, which can be found in various confluence locations. The goal is to make a very simple and easy process for people to request help from ECS PD. Ultimately we are looking to embed this process directly into our GUI so control system users can effortlessly report an issue, and provide all the helpful context we need to troubleshoot issues. An additional goal is visualizing the ECS PD work queue. Using Jira we can easily embed our backlog in confluence so anyone can see where their ticket is in the queue and lobby to change priority if needed. So far, our backlog is filling up with tasks from the XBD team as well as our own work. The next step will be to really apply Agile processes to organizing and prioritizing our work items.

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