ATLAS is a general purpose experiment aimed at studying high-energy particle interactions at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). This paper describes the evolution of the Controls and Configuration system of the ATLAS Trigger and Data Acquisition from the Technical Design Report to the first events taken with circulating beams. We present the lessons learned during the development. © 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

In the ATLAS experiment at the LHC, the output of readout hardware specific to each subdetector will be transmitted to buffers, located on custom made PCI cards ("ROBINs"). The data consist of fragments of events accepted by the first-level trigger at a maximum rate of 100 kHz. Groups of four ROBINs will be hosted in about 150 Read-Out Subsystem (ROS) PCs. Event data are forwarded on request via Gigabit Ethernet links and switches to the second-level trigger or to the Event builder. In this paper a discussion of the functionality and real-time properties of the ROS is combined with a presentation of measurement and modelling results for a testbed with a size of about 20% of the final DAQ system. Experimental results on strategies for optimizing the system performance, such as utilization of different network architectures and network transfer protocols, are presented for the testbed, together with extrapolations to the full system. ©2005 IEEE.

In the ATLAS experiment at the LHC, the output of read-out hardware specific to each subdetector will be transmitted to buffers, located on custom made PCI cards ("ROBINs"). The data consist of fragments of events accepted by the first-level trigger at a maximum rate of 100 kHz. Groups of four ROBINs will be hosted in about 150 Read-Out Subsystem (ROS) PCs. Event data are forwarded on request via Gigabit Ethernet links and switches to the second-level trigger or to the Event builder. In this paper a discussion of the functionality and real-time properties of the ROS is combined with a presentation of measurement and modelling results for a testbed with a size of about 20% of the final DAQ system. Experimental results on strategies for optimizing the system performance, such as utilization of different network architectures and network transfer protocols, are presented for the testbed, together with extrapolations to the full system. © 2006 IEEE.

The ATLAS combined test beam in the second half of 2004 saw the first deployment of the ATLAS High-Level Trigger (HLT). The next steps are deployment on the p re-series farms in the experimental area during 2005, commissioning and cosmics tests with the full detector in 2006 and collisions in 2007. This paper reviews the experience gained in the test beam, describes the current status and discusses the further enhancements to be made. We address issues related to the dataflow, integration of selection algorithms, testing, software distribution, installation and improvements. © 2006 IEEE.

The ATLAS combined test beam in the second half of 2004 saw the first deployment of the ATLAS High-Level Triggers (HLT). The next steps are deployment on the pre-series farms in the experimental area during 2005, commissioning and cosmics tests in 2006 and collisions in 2007. This paper reviews the experience gained in the test beam, describes the current status and discusses the further enhancements to be made. We address issues related to the dataflow, selection algorithms, testing, software distribution, installation and improvements. © 2005 IEEE.