IInterim Release 1 (Ir1) of the EOS Core System (ECS) is being delivered to sites as you read this. Successfully developed on planned schedule and cost, this first installment of ECS provides key capabilities to prepare for its Release A and B successors. In addition to the hardware and commercial software already installed at the Goddard, Langley, and EROS Data Center Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs), and the Hughes Engineering Development Facility (EDF), these sites will be receiving custom software and final configurations through January, 1996.
Ir1 capabilities include a suite of specialized tools to support ECS Science Software Integration and Test (SSI&T), early Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) interface testing, and early introduction of the state-of-the-art, highly evolvable ECS infrastructure as described briefly below.
Science Software I&T
A major goal of Ir1 is to provide early capabilities for the integration and test of science software. The science software is being developed by various Mission to Planet Earth (MTPE) science investigators to generate the data products that ECS will manage and distribute on an unprecedented scale. The science software, for this release, includes Version 1 of the TRMM instrument science software and beta versions of EOS AM-1 instrument science software.
Ir1 provides an environment for the refinement of the integration and test processes to be performed by each ECS DAAC. A variety of integration and test tools are provided, including compilers, math libraries, code checkers, configuration management tools, resource monitoring tools, and visualization and display tools for results checking. Dynamic software test tools are also provided including: a prototype scheduler based on Platinum's Autosys scheduler to register, queue, and run encapsulated science software components (product generation executives or "PGEs") singly or in dependent chains; profiling tools; and a DAAC toolkit that includes "hooks" into the ECS system management framework.
The integration and test capabilities of the release enable the science software to test the portability of the software from the developers computing environment to the DAAC environment. The science software utilizes an ECS Science Data Processing Toolkit designed to facilitate the portability of science software. The current Toolkit (Version 5, also delivered on-time in August 1995) is provided for the developers' computing facilities and for the DAAC. Ir1 supports the testing of the compatibility of both Science Computing Facility (SCF) and DAAC instantiations of the toolkit.
TRMM Interface Testing
The second purpose of the release is to support early testing of key ECS external interfaces. The testing directly supports interface development for ECS Release A, and provides support to the TRMM Project for the development of the TRMM ground system. The TRMM interfaces to be tested include data ingest interfaces between the TRMM Science Data Processing Facility and the Langley and Goddard DAACs, and the interfaces between the TRMM Science and Data Information System (TSDIS) and the Goddard and Marshall DAACs. In addition, the release will test interfaces for the ingest of data from NOAA and the Goddard Data Assimilation Office.
ECS Infrastructure
Ir1 provides an early implementation of ECS' system and network management capabilities as well as its distributed communication services. These services form an infrastructure that supports the functioning of the application software and the operation of the release as a whole. This infrastructure is designed to be reusable for Release A.
The infrastructure supports services for event logging, file transfer, e-mail, bulletin boards, and virtual terminals. A number of Distributed Computing Environment (DCE)-based services are supported, including security services, user authorization, user account management, and directory and naming services. The infrastructure provides a system management capability for fault and performance monitoring, and for network management and monitoring. A network management capability is provided to support the "shadow management" of some of the network components of the EOSDIS Version 0 system. These components are fully transitioned to EOSDIS Version 1 with Release A. The infrastructure also provides configuration management software, office automation tools, and a World Wide Web browser.
Risk Reduction
ECS is one of the world's largest and most complex data systems. The delivery of Ir1 reduces both the schedule risk and the technical risk for the ECS program as a whole. The early development and shakedown of the science software, external interfaces, and the reusable infrastructure insures that critical Release A functionality will be completed well before the deployment of Release A in late 1996. Over 75,000 lines of custom software, 32 commercial software packages, and 5 Unix environments including Silicon Graphics Inc. (SGI), Sun Microsystems Inc. (Sun), and Hewlett Packard (HP) have already gone into the making of this first installment of ECS capability.
Ir1 is expected to be available for (EOS/TRMM) Instrument Team (IT) and DAAC use in February, 1996.