SODA - THE REDUCED DATABASE FOR THE TDEV TOKAMAK

SODA which stands for Systeme d'Organisation des Donnees et d'Analyse, is a general database for TdeV. SODA has the following goals: to prod uce a database of a reduced set of physical data; to ensure that these data are validated; to record all the parameters relevant to tokamak operation and experiments; to facilitate the retrieval of data using g iven selection criteria; and to improve data accessibility and analysi s. The relational database ORACLE(TM) has been chosen to provide flexi bility and to accommodate the increasing expectations of the TdeV rese archers. In-house expertise allows custom-made tables and centralized data management. In the process of creating SODA several new interface s for the scientific coordinator, machine operator, and diagnosticians have been added to provide a better definition of the experiment for the archiving system. The database includes the more relevant machine and diagnostic parameters, plasma perturbations (rf, biasing, gas...), mean and standard deviation of physical signals, plasma profiles, and code results (equilibrium...) for selected time windows in a discharg e. Users of the X-window interface of SODA are not required to know th e database structure or the SQL language. SODA has been operating succ essfully for over a year and its capabilities are continuously expandi ng. (C) 1997 American Institute of Physics.