Table of Contents

IRMIS Overview

"IRMIS is a collaborative effort among several EPICS sites to build a common Relational DataBase schema and a set of tools to populate and search an RDB that contains information about the operational EPICS IOCs installed at that site." IRMIS (the schema, crawler programs and UI) was developed by Don Dohan and Claude Saunders at APS. For general information and distributions see the IRMIS Overview

For reference and more information on EPICS, here is EPICS Collaboration main site


NEW items (Feb. 2014) are indicated by a blue italic bold font.

IRMIS @ SLAC

IRMIS is used at SLAC for the following purposes, from several different interfaces:

Elements of the IRMIS database that have been adopted and modified for the controls software group at SLAC:

Elements modified or created at SLAC:

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UI and DATABASE QUERYING

IRMIS GUI
This is a java UI for the IRMIS Oracle database, developed by Claude Saunders of the EPICS collaboration, can be invoked in 3 ways:

  1. from the lclshome edm display:
    click the “IRMIS…” button
  2. from a Solaris or Linux workstation:
    run this script:
    irmisUI

The gui paradigm is a set of “document types”; click the File/New Document menu for the list. Right now there are only 2 available for use at SLAC:

Query results can be saved to an ascii file for further processing.

IOC Parameters APEX application
This is an APEX application showing IOC configuration data, and various operational parameter snapshots (obtained live nightly using caget).
https://seal.slac.stanford.edu/apex/mccqa/f?p=104:8

EPICS camdmp APEX application
Various reports listing PVs and their module and channel connections.
https://seal.slac.stanford.edu/apex/mccqa/f?p=103:4

IOC list report (run nightly)

This html report is created nightly by the LCLS PV Crawler
http://mccas0.slac.stanford.edu/crawler/ioc_report.html

PV Crawler logs (which include the duplicate PV lists)
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/grp/lcls/controls/sysGroup/report/
a subset here: http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-bin/lwgate/CONTROLS-SOFTWARE-REPORTS/archives

SQL querying
A view has been created to ease sql querying for PV lists. This view combines data from the IOC_BOOT, IOC, REC and REC_TYPE tables. It selects currently loaded PVs, where IOC_BOOT.CURRENT_LOAD = 1, with the latest IOC boot date captured.

Discontinued: IOC Info query application
This is a jsp web application containing data about IOCs and applications, and their configurations.  It is no longer maintained.
https://seal.slac.stanford.edu/IRMISQueries/

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IRMIS@SLAC INFORMATION FLOW DIAGRAMS AND LOAD PROCESSES LIST

IRMIS LOAD PROCESSES IN REVERSE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER (snip from Data Validation daily e-mail)

 

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OPERATIONAL and SUPPORT DETAILS

Each job and process sends a status e-mail to a selected list of recipients.

Emails, in chronological order

  1. FACET PV Crawler errors and warnings: output from the FACET crawler  (to: Shashi, Jingchen, Poonam, Judy)  note: warnings are not serious, just fyiIn general.
  2. LCLS PV Crawler errors and warnings: output from the LCLS crawler  (to: controls-software-reports, Shashi, Jingchen, Poonam, Judy)  note: warnings are not serious, just fyi.  In general.
  3. MCCQA SLAC CD PV Crawler errors and warnings: output from the CD (NLCTA) crawler  (to: Shashi, Jingchen, Poonam, Judy)
  4. <timestamp> IRMIS data validation <SUCCESSFUL or FAILED>: shows whether the data validation succeeded or not, and the status of each job in the sequence in reverse cron order, and logfiles to refer to in case of issues  (to: controls-software-reports, Shashi, Jingchen, Poonam, Judy)
  5. IRMIS data sync to MCCO completed: Only received if the data validation was successful, and the sync to MCCO completed.  (to: Shashi, Jingchen, Poonam, Judy)
  6. DUPLICATE PVs FOUND in FACET and LCLS: Only received if duplicate PVs were found. (to: controls-software-reports, Ernest, Shashi, Jingchen, Mike Z., Murali)

** Only LCLS data validation will affect the sync to MCCO.  FACET, and CD e-mails are fyi only.

Daily monitoring of e-mails

  1. Check the "IRMIS data validation" e-mail title:SUCCESS or FAILED?  If it's SUCCESSful, and there is a subsequent "IRMIS data sync to MCCO completed", then all is well.
  2. If the data validation FAILED:
      1. What does the message for the DATA_VALIDATION step say?  The errors found will be listed.  (e.g. "PV Count drop > 5000", and/or "LCLS Crawler did not complete", etc.)
      2. Refer to the <acc> PV Crawler errors and warnings e-mails.  These show the changes in PV counts by IOC (useful in locating which IOC's PVs count dropped for example)
      3. If needed, go to the logfiles: see "IRMIS data validation" email for the log directory for each crawler.  Also, see table below for logfiles to refer to.

At SLAC, what the PV crawlers update, in a nutshell

Oracle schemas and accounts

The IRMIS database schema is installed in 4 SLAC Oracle instances:

Other Oracle accounts

For passwords see Poonam Pandey or Elie Grunhaus (or use getPwd)

As of September 15, all crawler-related shell scripts and perl scripts use Oracle Wallet to get the latest Oracle password. Oracle passwords must be changed every 6 months, and is coordinated and implemented by Poonam Pandey.

The IRMIS GUI uses hardcoded passwords. This must be changed “manually” at every password change cycle.  See below for detailed procedure.

Database structure

see schema diagram below. (this diagram excludes the EPICS camdmp structure, which is documented separately here: <url will be supplied>)

Crawler scripts

The PV crawler is run once for each IOC boot directory structure. The LCLS and FACET PV crawlers run the same code, that in the LCLS directory structure. The LCLS crawler code has been modified to be production-specific; it is a different version than the SLAC PV crawler.

The SLAC PV crawler (runSLACPVCrawler.csh) runs the crawler a couple of times to accommodate the various CD IOC directory structures.

NEW: As of mid-January 2014, the LCLS PV crawler now has a function to crawler $IOC_DATA/<ioc>/IOC.dbDumpRecord files, which contain an IOC's record names and a subset of configured fields.  This file is waaaaaay simpler to crawler than any ioc's st.cmd syntax.  If IOC.dbDumpRecord is found, it will be crawled.  If the file is not found, the old crawler code will operate on the ioc's st.cmd file.
At the same time, the FACET PV crawler scripts were modified to share the LCLS crawler code, so IOC.dbDumpRecord files are also crawled for FACET.

As IOCs are rebooted during maintenance and upgrades, IOC.dbDumpRecord will eventually become the only files crawled in the system, resulting in easier maintenance.

cron jobs

PV crawler operation summary

For the location of the crawler scripts, see Source code directories below.
Basic steps as called by cron scripts are:

    1. run FACET pv crawler to populate MCCQA tables
    2. run LCLS pv crawlers to populate MCCQA tables
    3. run Data Validation for PV data in MCCQA
    4. if Data Validation returns SUCCESS, run synchonization of MCCQA data to selected (3 only at the moment) MCCO tables.
    5. run caget4curr_ioc_device to populate caget columns of curr_ioc_device

** For PV Crawlers: the crawler group for any given IOC is determined by its row in the IOC table. The system column refers to the boot group for the IOC, as shown below.

LOGFILES, Oracle audit table

Log filenames are created by appending a timestamp to the root name shown in the tables below.

The major steps in the crawler jobs write entries into the Oracle CONTROLS_GLOBAL.DATA_VALIDATION_AUDIT table. Each entry has these attributes:

Descriptions of the MAIN scripts (there other subsidiary scripts as well):

these are all ultimately invoked from the cron jobs shown above; the cron scripts call the others.

BLUE script names are on the CD side

GREEN script names are on the LCLS side

PURPLE script names are on the FACET side

{table:border=1}
{tr}
{th}script name{th}
{th}descr{th}
{tr}
{td}{color:#0000ff}runAllCDCrawlers.csh{color}\\  {color:#0000ff}{_}in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{color}{td}
{td}runs
* SLAC PV crawler
* data validation for all current crawl data (LCLS and CD)
* sync to MCCO
\\
Logfile: /nfs/slac/g/cd/log/irmis/pv/ CDCrawlerAll.log
{td}
{tr}
{td}{color:#0000ff}runSLACPVCrawler.csh{color}\\  {color:#0000ff}{_}in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{color}{td}
{td}run by runAllCDCrawlers.csh: crawls NLCTA IOCs (previously handled PEPII IOCs)
\\
The PV crawler is run 4 times within this script to accommodate the various boot directory structures:
|| system || IOCs crawled || log files ||
| NLCTA | IOCs booted from $CD_IOC on gtw00. \\
Boot dirs mirrored to /nfs/mccfs0/u1/pepii/mirror/cd/ioc for crawling | /nfs/slac/g/cd/log/irmis/pv/pv_crawlerLOG_ALL.\* \\
/tmp/pvCrawler.log |
| TR01 | TR01 only (old boot structure) | /nfs/slac/g/cd/log/irmis/pv/pv_crawlerLOG_TR01.\* \\
/tmp/pvCrawler.log |
{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}runLCLSPVCrawlerLx.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}crawls LCLS IOCs
|| system || IOCs crawled || log files ||
| LCLS | LCLS PRODUCTION IOCs. all IOC dirs in \\
$IOC /usr/local/lcls/epics/iocCommon | /u1/lcls/tools/crawler/pv/pv_crawlerLOG_LCLS.timestamp \\
/tmp/ LCLSPVCrawl.log (log in as laci@lcls-daemon2)|
{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#800080}runFACETPVCrawlerLx.bash{color}\\  {color:#800080}{_}in /usr/local/facet/tools/irmis/script/_{color} runs LCLS crawler code{td}
{td}crawls FACET IOCs
|| system || IOCs crawled || log files ||
| FACET | FACET PRODUCTION IOCs all IOC dirs in facet $IOC /usr/local/facet/epics/iocCommon | /u1/facettools/crawler/pv/pv_crawlerLOG_LCLS.timestamp \\
/tmp/FACETPVCrawl.log (log in as flaci@facet-daemon1)|
{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}run_find_devices.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}for LCLS and FACET only, populate the devices_and_attributes table, a list of device names and attributes based on the LCLS PV naming convention. For PV DEV:AREA:UNIT:ATTRIBUTE, DEV:AREA:UNIT is the device, ATTRIBUTE is the attribute.{td}
{tr}

{tr}\\
{td}{color:#008000}run_load_bsa_root_names.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}{td}
loads bsa_root_names table by running stored procedure LOAD_BSA_ROOT_NAMES. LCLS and FACET names.{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}ioc_report.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}
{color:#800080}ioc_report-facet.bash{color}\\  {color:#800080}{_}in /usr/local/facet/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}runs at the end of the LCLS PV crawl, which is last, creates the web ioc report:
\\
[http://www.slac.stanford.edu/grp/cd/soft/database/reports/ioc_report.html]

{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#0000ff}updateMaterializedViews.csh{color}\\  {color:#0000ff}{_}in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{color}{td}
{td}refreshes materialized view from curr_pvs{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}findDupePVs.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}
{color:#800080}findDupePVs-all.bash{color}\\  {color:#800080}{_}in /usr/local/facet/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}finds duplicate PVs for reporting to e-mail
\\
(the \--all version takes system as a parameter){td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}refresh_curr_ioc_device.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}refreshes the curr_ioc_device table with currently booted info from ioc_device (speeds up query in the Archiver PV APEX app).
\\
Also see caget4curr_ioc_device.bash below.{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}find_LCLSpv_count_changes.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}
{color:#800080}find_pv_count_changes-all.bash{color}\\  {color:#800080}{_}in /usr/local/facet/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}finds the IOCs with PV counts that changed in the last LCLS crawler run. This is reported in the logfile, and in the daily e-mail.
\\
(the \--all version takes system as a parameter){td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}populate_dtyp_io_tab.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}populate_io_curr_pvs_and_fields.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}run_load_hw_dev_pvs.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}run_parse_camac_io.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}set of script to populate various tables for the EPICS camdmp APEX application.{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}write_data_validation_row.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}
{color:#0000ff}write_data_validation_row.csh{color}\\  {color:#0000ff}{_}in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{color}
{color:#800080}write_data_validation_row-facet.bash{color}\\  {color:#800080}{_}in /usr/local/facet/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}writes a row to the controls_global.data_validation_audit table (all environments){td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}runDataValidation.csh
\\
runDataValidation-facet.csh
\\
_in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{td}
{td}runs IRMISDataValidation.pl -- CD and LCLS PV data validation{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#b00e00}runSync.csh{color}\\  {color:#b00e00}{_}in /afs/slac/g/cd/soft/tools/irmis/cd_script{_}{color}{td}
{td}runs data replication to MCCO, currently these objects ONLY:
* curr_pvs
* bsa_root_names
* devices_and_attributes{td}
{tr}
{tr}
{td}{color:#008000}caget4curr_ioc_device.bash{color}\\  {color:#008000}{_}in /usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis/script/_{color}{td}
{td}does cagets to obtain IOC parameters for the curr_ioc_device table. Run as a separate cron job from the crawlers because cagets
\\
can hang unexpectedly -- they are best done in an isolated script\!{td}
{tr}
{table}

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Crawler cron schedule and error reporting

time

script

cron owner/host

8 pm

runFACETPVCrawlerLx.bash

flaci/facet-daemon1

9 pm

runLCLSPVCrawlerLx.bash

laci/lcls-daemon2

1:30 am

runAllCDCrawlers.csh

laci/lcls-prod01

4 am

caget4curr_ioc_device.bash

laci/lcls-daemon2

Following the crawls, the calling scripts grep for errors and warnings, and send lists of these to Judy Rock, Bob Hall and Ernest Williams, Jingchen Zhou. The LCLS PV crawler and the Data Validation scripts send messages to controls-software-reports as well. To track down the error messages in the e-mail, refer to the logs file du jour, the cron job /tmp output files, and the Oracle CONTROLS_GLOBAL.DATA_VALIDATION_AUDIT (see below for details on how to query this)

Source directories

description

cvs root

production directory tree root

details

IRMIS software

SLAC code has diverged from the original collaboration version, and LCLS IRMIS code has diverged from the main SLAC code (i.e. we have 2 different version of the IRMIS PV crawler.)

CD: /afs/slac/package/epics/tools/irmisV2_SLAC
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/cvsweb/tools/irmisV2_SLAC/?cvsroot=SLAC-EPICS-Releases

LCLS:
Please note different CVS location: the production directory for the LCLS crawlers is /usr/local/lcls/package/irmis/irmisV2_SLAC/. the LCLS "package" dir structure is NOT in CVSed. So, to modify crawler code, you can cvs co the code, modify, test, copy the mods straight into production, then CVS them.
CVS location is in tools/irmis/crawler_code_CVS
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/cvsweb/tools/irmis/crawler_code_CVS/?cvsroot=LCLS

CD:
/afs/slac/package/epics/tools/irmisV2_SLAC
LCLS:
/usr/local/lcls/package/irmis/irmisV2_SLAC

 

    • db/src/crawlers contains crawler source code. SLAC-specific crawlers are in directories named *SLAC
    • db/src/crawlers/pv contains PV crawler source code
    • db.properties file points to the database instance and username
    • apps/src contains UI source code.
    • apps/build.xml is the ant build file
    • README shows how to build the UI app using ant

CD scripts

For ease and clarity, the CD scripts are also in the LCLS CVS repository under
tools/irmis/cd_script, cd_utils, cd_config
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/cvsweb/tools/irmis/crawler_code_CVS/?cvsroot=LCLS

/afs/slac/g/cd/tools/irmis

 

    • cd_script contains most scripts
    • cd_utils has a few scripts
    • cd_config contains client crawler directory lists

LCLS scripts

/afs/slac/g/lcls/cvs
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/cvsweb/tools/irmis/?cvsroot=LCLS

/usr/local/lcls/tools/irmis

 

    • script contains the LCLS pv crawler run scripts, etc.
    • util has some subsidiary scripts

FACET scripts

These scripts share the LCLS repository (different names so they don’t collide with LCLS scripts)
http://www.slac.stanford.edu/cgi-wrap/cvsweb/tools/irmis/crawler_code_CVS/?cvsroot=LCLS

/usr/local/facet/tools/irmis

 

    • script contains the FACET pv crawler run scripts, etc.
    • util has some subsidiary scripts

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PV Crawler: what gets crawled and how

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Removing an IOC from the active crawler list

Sometimes an IOC becomes obsolete.  Although IOCs are automatically added to the IRMISDB.IOC table when the crawler encounters a new $IOC/<ioc> directory, IOCs are not automatically removed from the system.  Typically, an IOC engineer will request that her IOC be removed from the crawler (and hence all current PV and IOC lists, and reports).

To remove an IOC from the active crawler list:

Update the IRMISDB.IOC table in MCCQA to set the SYSTEM value to something that is not understood by the crawler:

update ioc

set system = 'LCLS-NOCRWL'

where ioc_nm = 'iocname';

or

update ioc

set system = FACET-NOCRWL'

where ioc_nm = 'iocname';

TROUBLESHOOTING: post-crawl emails and data_validation_audit entries: what to worry about, how to bypass or fix for a few…

Once a problem is corrected, the next night’s successful crawler jobs will fix up the data.

select * from controls_global.data_validation_audit where schema_nm=’IRMISDB’ order by tod desc;

This will show you (most recent first) the data validation entries, with any error messages.

You can also see a complete listing of data_validation_audit entries in reverse chron order by using AIDA (but you will have to pick out the IRMISDB lines):

For a “good” set of IRMISDB entries, scroll down and see those from: 9/22 9 pm, continuing into 9/23, which completed successfully. The steps in ascending order are:

FACET PV Crawler start
FACET PV Crawler finish
ALL_DATA_UPDATE start
LCLS PV Crawler start
LCLS PV Crawler finish
CD PV Crawler start
CD PV Crawler finish
DATA_VALIDATION start
DATA_VALIDATION finish
FACET DATA_VALIDATION start
FACET DATA_VALIDATION finish
ALL_DATA_UPDATE finish

then there are multiple steps for the sync to MCCO, labelled REFRESH_MCCO_IRMIS_TABLES

REFRESH_MCCO_IRMIS_TABLES will not kick off unless ALL_DATA_UPDATE finishes with a status of SUCCESS.

ONLY VALIDATION OF LCLS STEPS AND SUCCESS WILL AFFECT THE SYNC TO MCCO.  FACET, and CD e-mails are FYI ONLY.

some specific error checks:

Logfile messages sent in e-mail:

To bypass crawling specific IOC(s): update the IOC table and for the IOC(s) in question, set SYSTEM to something other than LCLS or NLCTA (e.g. LCLS-TEMP-NOCRAWL) so it/they will not be crawled next time.  NOTE: if you change the SYSTEM column for an IOC, it will no longer appear in the curr_pvs view.

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In the event of an error that stops crawling, here are the affected end-users of IRMIS PVs:

(usually not an emergency, just decay of the accuracy of the lists over time.)

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3 possible worst case workarounds:

  1. Synchronization to MCCO that bypasses error checking
  2. Comment out code in IRMISDataValidation.pl
  3. Really worst case! Edit the MCCO tables manually

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crawling a brand new directory structure

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HOW TO CHANGE THE IRMISDB ORACLE PASSWORD IN THE IRMIS GUI

The IRMIS gui uses Hibernate for its database interface.  It's possible the Oracle wallet could be superimposed on Hibernate, but the path for doing this is unclear and will take time to work out (maybe worth doing in the future tho!)

Therefore the IRMIS gui Oracle password must be changed manually.  Here is the procedure:

  1. log into mcclogin
  2. cvs co irmis gui code:
    export CVSROOT=/afs/slac/package/epics/slaconly/cvs
    cd to a working directory
    cvs co -d irmis tools/irmisV2_SLAC
  3. cd irmis
  4. edit site.build.properties and change this line:
       db.trust-read-write.password=newpw
  5. set java environment to version 1.4 (this may not be needed):

        export JAVA_HOME=/afs/slac/package/java/@sys/jdk1.4

        export JAVA_VER=1.4

        export PATH=${JAVA_HOME}/bin:${PATH}

  6. cd db
  7. ant clean
  8. ant deploy
  9. cd ..
  10. cp db/build/irmisDb.jar  apps/deploy
  11. cd apps/deploy
  12. test the gui:
    java -jar irmis.jar
    The gui should connect to the db.
  13. deploy new jars to production:
    scp irmisDb.jar over to /usr/local/lcls/package/irmis/irmisV2_SLAC/apps/deploy/.   (this one is used by LCLS and FACET)
    cp irmisDb.jar /afs/slac/package/epics/tools/irmisV2_SLAC/apps/deploy/.

*** Please note, the app directory (parallel to the db directory) is not build-able in ant anymore, because of changes in java version syntax and method calls deep in the gui code.  Therefore, please follow the directions above to BUILD AND DEPLOY THE DB JAR ONLY!

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IRMISDB history data cleanup

$TOOLS/irmis/data_cleanup has scripts and a README for cleaning historical IRMIS data.  The procedure has been done once in February, 2012.

Description and plans and click IRMIS_database_cleanup

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SCHEMA DIAGRAM

source (loaded into IRMIS nightly via crawler script)