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Field System

Burgess explained that a replacement for the HP1000 field system would be required in the near future. A Mk4 system was available but this required a high end PC running a real time Unix (VENIX). The total cost was 17,000 dollars which was considered to be expensive. There are other real-time unix's. Graham has run DARFS on an HP-PA workstation using the latter's DOS emulation package. Burgess felt that DARFS needed another serious effort. The Australians may be modifying DARFS to control MkIII terminals as they have no HP 1000. Graham noted that neither systems could extract phase-cals or radiometry data. Alef complained about the limitations of MS-DOS, in particular it is impossible to save log files during a session since there is no multi-tasking capability. It was felt that this difficulty could be overcome. Schilizzi wondered if we should be trying to use the same software at each of the EVN stations. The general feeling was yes but Porcas pointed out that some procedures (e.g. frequency changes) would always have to be site specific.