DIAL release 1.20
David Adams
29jul05
Previous release (1.10)
Next release (1.30)
Basics
Release 1.20 was made June 8, 2005.
There are some updates.
The main distribution is built on RedHat Enterprise 3 and
certified on SLC3.
There is a separate build using RedHat 7.3 with gcc 3.2.3.
For more information about DIAL, please see the
DIAL home page.
The primary user of DIAL is
ATLAS distributed analysis.
This release provides support for running analysis and supporting services
as well as clients for those services. The clients include a collection of
command line tools and a ROOT dictionary that provides direct access to the
DIAL classes. A python-based client witha graphical interface is available
separately.
Getting started
The first time you use the new version of DIAL, you will need to add an
instruction to your login file. See the
getting started page for instructions
on this and for starting the DIAL command line or ROOT interface.
The best way to start with DIAL is to run one of the demos inside ROOT.
These demos define a job (application papp, task ptsk and dataset pdst)
and submit it to the current scheduler (msch). Step-by-step
instructions may be found on the
demo page.
For example of serious analysis, see the
examples page.
In case of problems, see the
failed job page.
Datasets
A list of available datasets may be obtained from the
DSC query page
or by querying the DSC (dataset selection catalog, object dsc) from root
or python.
Use the query "level='TOP'" to restrict the selection to the top-level datasets
intended for analysis. We plan to make all the Rome datasets and any others
requested available in this catalog.
Transformations
Transformations act on datasets to produce new datasets. Input datasets typically
describe event data (e.g. AOD or ESD) and output datasets may include event
data, analysis objects such as histograms and ntuples or a combination of these.
A transformation is obtained by combining an "application" which provides the
script for running the job with "task" that carries user configuration such as
job options or code.
See the ADA transformation page
for information about ATLAS transformations including descriptions of the
supported task interfaces.
Some useful applications and example tasks are cataloged. A typical scenario would
have a user select an application and task and then modify the task for his or her
own analysis. The application and task catalogs may also be examined using the
ASC query page and
TSC query page
or by querying from root or python (objects asc and tsc).
Services
Deployed and maintained DIAL services are described on the
DIAL service page which includes a link to the
ADA service monitor.
The latter is a good place to see what services are available at any given time.
Python support
A python interface to DIAL is provided as part of the GANGA project.
See the PyDIAL page
for links to documentation and demos.
GUI
A GUI for job submission and monitoring is also provided as part of the GANGA
project. See the ADA job builder
page for more information.
Installating your own release
A distribution kit including both clients and services is available
for this release.
Follow the instructions on the
installation page.
Here are the current binary distributions for this release:
RHE3, SL3 and SLC3
RH73 with GCC 3.2.
Building your own release
See the build page for instructions. Here is the
package list.
Installing your own service
Instruction for deploying a DIAL service may be found
here.
The code
Here are links to the CVS modules
externals
dataset packages
dial packages
LXR
WSDL and DTD
Here are WSDL files for the DIAL services:
analysis
unique ID
repository
The DTD files defining the XML schema are
Dataset DTD
DIAL DTD
Note that as of this release, it is not longer necessary to have
copies of the files in the directories where XML objects are parsed.
Additional information
Release notes
and notes from development release 1.01
Known bugs.
Changes in release 1.11
Essential changes before making this release
dladams@bnl.gov