Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

Rod Nussbaumer <[email protected]> · Thu, 06 Dec 2012 08:21:23 -0800

Pavel:

It depends what is meant by 'EPICS development'.

If your intent is to create EPICS databases, display list files (EDM,

etc.), and sundry text-based files, then Redhat/Scientific Linux has

worked well for us (currently migrating to SL6.x). We use SL4, SL5, &

SL6 to develop EDM screens that are deployed in production on SL6

operator consoles. There is concern that the Motif support on the

production hosts is creating problems that have been difficult to

characterize and solve. This is not an EPICS development matter per se,

but since our intention is to use development hosts that are consistent

with production hosts wherever it makes sense, there is a connection. We

try to build utilities such as EDM, StripTool, alh, etc, on development

hosts that are the same as the production host targets. This has not

always been without problems on Redhat based systems.

As a platform for development of IOC software using C/C++, and

especially where cross-development for other architectures is involved,

I have found the Redhat line difficult to use. Debian seems well suited

to that purpose, since it is much less conservative in terms of

toolchain versions. We are now supporting native development for

linux-x86 targets, and cross-development for linux-arm targets. Native

development is done with Debian 6 native toolchains. Building cross

toolchains for Arm targets just never worked on Redhat based hosts.

Cross toolchains built on Debian but running on SL4/SL5/SL6 seems to work.

We are migrating toward Linux as the host platform for both development

and for hosting IOCs and other EPICS utilities. Decoupling the

development host platform from the IOC host platform is seen as helpful

to prevent breakage as each platform evolves independently. We never use

the target host as a development host for either native or cross

development.

Personally, I could never endorse the use of Fedora as a host platform

for IOCs, any EPICS-related development, or operator consoles. I see the

lack of long term support for stable versions as a definite deal-breaker.

I cannot comment on the use of 64-bit code, except to say that the

number of issues observed on this mailing list that resulted from the

use of 64-bit Linux software has kept us from adopting it at all until

now. I avoid the use of the term 'stable' to describe OS's and software,

since as I understand it, the term was coined to mean something that

most people do not imply by it's use.

Rod Nussbaumer
ISAC Controls, TRIUMF
Vancouver, Canada

On 12/06/2012 06:44 AM, Pavel Maslov wrote:

Could you recommend me a stable Linux distribution for EPICS development?

Pavel Maslov, MS
Controls Engineer at Pulsed power Lab
Efremov Institute for Electro-Physical Apparatus
St. Petersburg, Russia

Mobile: +7 (951) 672 22 19
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Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System