High-throughput operation of beamlines at modern synchrotrons may be hindered by frequent realignment of beamline optics, especially when the beamlines are multi-purpose. An example is the BioCAT 18ID beamline at the APS providing beamtime for research in X-ray spectroscopy, diffraction, scattering and imaging areas. At the BioCAT, reduction in the realignment time was previously achieved by performing fast on-the-fly scans which were by orders of magnitude faster than the commonly used step scans. Friendly GUI eased this custom-built fast-scan software use. However, the static graphical user interfaces were not suitable for dynamic construction of scanning job sequences and became an obvious obstacle on the way to full automation of beamline alignment and data collection. A solution was found in creating an integrated development environment that provides a possibility to graphically construct beamline control scripts using the well-tested fast-scan procedures combined with logic operators (such as do and if) and some data analysis functions. The software is written in Java and uses EPICS Easy Channel Access for Java (EZJCA) implemented on top of JCA package. Scripts are saved in XML format and executed by Apache Ant. JFreeChart is used for graphs. The first functionality test results are discussed.
Abstract File: abstract00105.txt
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