Improvements and extensions to the configuration tools of the TaskManager HLT software in the ALICE experiment at CERN

Abstract

This thesis concerns work done to improve andextend software that is used to configure nodesand trigger software in HLT under the ALICEexperiment at CERN. HLT is a large computercluster that will be used to reduce data fromthe ALICE experiment to a an amount manageableby storage systems. To accomplish thisefficiently the processing is distributedthroughout the cluster and the configurationtools are used to decide how this distributionshould be done. The configuration tools arecomposed of a few Python programs and templates,which generates configuration files for allparticipating nodes by taking input from asingle XML file describing the entire setup.While optimization and general improvement isone part of this thesis, the emphasis will be onextending the software to incorporatefunctionality for creating a more structuredcontrol hierarchy in the HLT data processingframework.This thesis will present the tasks to beresolved, discuss possible solutions anddescribe the development process.