Interface Specifications

PROTOCOL

The user interface to the detector controller server supports standard TCP/IP sockets. The interface uses simple mnemonic, English-looking ASCII-character commands and return values.

CONFIGURATION

User-configurable parameters are defined in a configuration file which is read upon start-up of the server. When the server is run as a daemon then the configuration file will also be read when the HUP signal is received. The configuration file is ASCII plain text formatted as:

KEY=VALUE # optional comment

Configuration keys also support arrays by specifying the configuration line as:

KEY=(IDX VALUE)
KEY=(IDX VALUE)
etc.

This will assign VALUE to index IDX in an array of keys of name KEY. Allowed keywords are shown in Table 1. Any text following the number sign "#" is ignored and may be used to include comments. Some of these keys can only be set in the configuration file and cannot be changed while the server is running, but others are simply defaults which can be readily changed or overridden by a command. Keys which can be changed or overridden via command are indicated in the 3rd column of Table 1 by the command which changes them.

Table 1. Server configuration keywords

KEY	Description	Command override?
ARCHON_IP	IP address for Archon controller communications Archon only	no