Migration of alcator C-Mod computer infrastructure to Linux

The Alcator C-Mod fusion experiment at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts has been operating for twelve years. The data handling for the experiment during most of this period was based on MDSplus running on a cluster of VAX and Alpha computers using the OpenVMS operating system. While the OpenVMS operating system provided a stable reliable platform, the support of the operating system and the software layered on the system has deteriorated in recent years. With the advent of extremely powerful low cost personal computers and the increasing popularity and robustness of the Linux operating system a decision was made to migrate the data handling systems for C-Mod to a collection of PC’s running Linux. This paper will describe the new system configuration, the effort involved in the migration from OpenVMS, the results of the first run campaign under the new configuration and the impact the switch may have on the rest of the MDSplus community.