Characteristics of the TRISTAN control computer network

Twenty-four minicomputers forming an N-to-N token-ring network control the TRISTAN accelerator complex. The computers are linked by optical fiber cables with 10 Mbps transmission speed. The software system is based on NODAL, a multicomputer interpretive language developed at the CERN SPS. The high-level services offered to the users of the network are remote execution by the EXEC, EXEC-P and IMEX commands of NODAL and uniform file access throughout the system. The network software was designed to achieve the fast response of the EXEC command. The performance of the network is also reported.