Our scientific observations involve a large number of steps to ensure the data quality for which we are world-renowned, but what if we could further improve productivity by simulating our operations?
That’s just what the recent HILSE (Hardware in the Loop Simulation Environment) project achieves: providing an infrastructure that is representative of the production environment for software and firmware testing while allowing engineers to perform maintenance activities efficiently.
“During the pandemic we were creating new ideas to achieve this goal, working and providing all the necessary documentation. It was really a great team work, and all Design & Made in ALMA Chile”, says Claudio Follert, Electronic technician I of the Antenna Maintenance Group, who was also in charge of modifying the old Tclots room to convert it into the now called “HIL Room”.
HIL is a concept known in the design and manufacture of complex systems when it is not possible to perform all the necessary functional tests. For this purpose, a simulation environment faithfully representative of the final system is built, where all kinds of tests and new developments are carried out. In the case of ALMA, the HILSE project successfully implemented a full-scale replica of the complete observatory, including a subset of the hardware and software used in regular operations.
What are the benefits? Among its advantages, HILSE allows us to test in the development process, reducing the cost of testing, as well as increasing its coverage, flexibility and repeatability.
The idea was presented in 2016 at the SPIE conference and finally, after several steps of approval and verification, was delivered to ALMA last year, after being accepted by the respective committee.
“The proposal was very attractive because it would allow to increase the frequency and coverage of the system tests with less impact on scientific efficiency, at lower cost and in a safer way”, explains José Luis Ortiz, our Digital Systems Technical Lead, and who for this project was in charge of collaborating in the implementation of the components related to the Back End subsystem, such as photonic references, signal synchronization and optical fibers.
Although it is just starting to operate, the good results have been immediate. It was used to validate new hardware for the correlator without intervening in the production system and has been used for the validation of the new ALMA software cycle. More importantly, its use will enable hundreds of additional hours of astronomical observing. HILSE is also expected to be a key part of the development and testing of the new instrumentation coming as part of the ALMA 2030 project.
Maravilloso!!! Bravo!! Felicitaciones a quienes hicieron eso posible!!
HILSE for the win1 Thank you everyone for the ground work for future testing of the Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade projects!