The STAR experiment

 FGT comissioning & software

Present: Stephen,Hal,Jan, Len,Paul,Anselm,Will

Minutes:

• Stephen reported he can generate peds+status tables for arbitrary run. The strip QA criteria are based on the pedestal shpe, will evolve. Jan added: later one may incorporate absence of signal as yet more QA step.
• There is discussion between Renee & Stephen what should be used as key in the offline DB for FGT. They will tell us what has been decided.
• Ramiro reported he exercised changing of APVs peds or all but one assembly 
  • Action item:  fix not responding assembly 13, RDO=0, ARM=1, GRP=1 (serving 3DA) before STAR close donw on Friday 
  • no furtehr APV ped changes will be  done until a decision is made we want them at a different place than for  run 13016031
  • tenatively we want peds to be 3 sigma above zero for the lowest pedestal in given APV chip
  • Action item:  find peds +RMS for   run 13016031, Jan+Stephen
  • Action item:  Jan asked Ramiro for a series of 6 runs taken with varied pedestals level in selected APVs to verify the gross mapping in DB, details are here
• Len presented the first stab in to understanding of the time structure of FGT pulses based on the cosmic data. It was welcome we see the raw shapes. It was not so clear if shape params extracted from the cosmic stand data can be used to decide  how to set the timing for STAR daq runs.  We certainly need to develope the tools analyzing those shapes before we will look at the STAR daq data. Len will continue, implementing the following:
  • exclude bad strips
    • Action item:  Stephen, can you please generate list of bad strips for this one cosmic data file we all play and hand it to Len
  • modify the fit function to allow varied T0 for every pulse - this should improve chi2/dof
  • apply constrain for the amplitude shape parameter for all (many) strips served by the same APV for all events - those will be one of the outputs used to decided which APV setting are the best
  • verify if sturated shapes (fig 8) are perhaps associated with a specific hardware
  • current method of finding pedestal as {min ADC} over 5 data values could be replaced by the actual pedestals comming out of the same code producing the status tables.
  • Jan asked to not ask Len to do anything else until we have fully functional tool finding timing shapes.
• Ramiro and Willie are comissioning now (3pm) automatic generation of raw spectra plots using Willie's software
• JPlot - awaiting update of plots as discussed earlier, no new plots were requested
• HV GUI, 3 buttons: Paul reported on existing features of HV GUI (see HN mail),
  • Action item: Paul agreed to add the off/standby/run buttons within a week, to be ready by January 25, if we decide soon and do not ask for ferrari
  • Action item:  FGT folks need to agree what those buttons should do (and do not ask for too much), Jan sent proposal to fgt-hn , please comment within a ~day
•  SOFTWARE meeting :
  • Action item: Tuesday meetings will be  discontinued, instead commissioning + software meeting will be held on Wednesday
  • it was understood software needed to evaluate pp200 data sets is critical, no clear plan what would it do and who would it develope, Anslem will continue  thinking about it tomorrow
  • Anselm will evaluate cluster finder he developed using geant tracks 

Reminder: last week we have agread on the FGT comissioing plan (here)

Agenda:

1.  Run preparation (ongoing tasks) Jan's 4 slides
   1.  ped+stat determination, ; Stephen; example PDF ,  JAN-SLIDE 1 
      1.  list of broken APVs channels ; Stephen (CSV table?)
      2. exercise full cycle of upload to DB, confirmation (who)
   2.  pedestal adjustment in APV; Ramiro (post,  old settings  run 13015002 , new settings run 13016031),  JAN-SLIDE 2
   3. study of raw signal vs. time bin: Len, work in progress (blog)
   4.  coordination of deployment of Willie's FGT monitoring; Ramiro+Willie,  blog page, Jan-SLIDE-3
   5. missing/changes in FGT plots in JPLot ; All  (see JPlots in  Ramiro's tasks)
   6. status of HV GUI to command 14 quadrants in parallel; Paul
   7. mapping
      1. location of APV vs. Rxy ; Ben+Stephen
      2. mapping - gross check of APV , JAN-SLIDE 4
   8. automatization of the HV , FEE slow control : '3 buttons: on/off/standby'; Paul
   9. Identified manpower/dates/ HV test, gas mix swap; Jan calendar
   10. How will be assemble FGT OPS - use 'open Drupal' ?; Jan
2.   Software tasks/issues, led by Anselm
   1. eval of pp200 data sets to set working point for pp500
   2.  eval of the cluster finder w/ geant tracks (residua)
   3.  software plan for next 2-3 months (with deadlines?)
   4. date of FGT offline code review