Minutes 23 April 2001.Html

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on

23rd April 2001

Presents:
CERN: J.Apostolakis, G.Cosmo, G.Folger, M.G.Pia, S.Sadilov.
ESTEC: P.Nienimen (phone).
KEK: Y.Morita.
Fukui: S.Tanaka (phone).
LAPP: M.Maire.
Naruto: H.Yoshida (phone).
Orsay: M.Verderi.
Excused: J.Allison, M.Asai, H.Kurasige, T.Sasaki.

General paper

Most sections of the paper are at the 2nd Draft, some still at the 1st Draft level. A summary and general comments have been distributed by J.Allison just after the latest editors' meeting.

General considerations

  • Some concerns have been expressed about the quality of the general paper even for sections currently at the 2nd Draft level.
  • The paper should be well structured to avoid unnecessary citations, comparisons or sentences which could make the paper outdated in short time (the paper is supposed to serve as reference for at least the next 10-15 years for experiment publications).
  • "The Geant4 Simulation Toolkit" has been suggested as the title for the paper.
More detailed comments
  • The section on the history of the Project in chapter-1 is felt inadequate for a scientific paper. It has been expressed the wish to involve S.Giani for a contribution in this chapter.
  • In chapter-2, it has been suggested to include appropriate design diagrams of the key parts (ex. top-level physics diagrams)
  • For chapter-5 a general overview of the physics is seen appropriate, by adding references to existing papers and leaving details to more specific papers which will be published in future. The section on optical processes should be reduced.
  • In chapter-7, the section on analysis should be rewritten; it has been suggested to involve A.Pfeiffer in writing this section.
  • A section on persistency should be added in chapter-6.
  • It has been suggested to restructure/reformat the text into Elsevier style format immediately after the review, in order to have an idea of what will be the final shape/size of the paper.
Actions
  • Authors who have been contacted for the 2nd Draft to include suggested changes and refinements and did not contribute yet, have been kindly invited to provide their contributions as soon as possible !
  • J.Apostolakis asked to WG coordinators to provide a list of people who have substantially contributed in the development of their Category since the start of RD44. The list should be sent in LaTeX format to John by Monday, April 30th indicating name and home institution (NB: not Geant4 affiliation!).

Activity report

The status of the report is much less advanced than the general paper. Most of the sections are still at the 1st Draft level and several are still missing.

General considerations

  • It has been acknowledged that at least one author did not receive feedback from the editors.
  • In chapter-4, it has been suggested to restructure WG blocks at level of subsections. For each WG provide a brief introduction on scope and activities concerned, and include an estimate of resources and WG members.
Actions
  • Each WG coordinator should send by Monday, April 30th a list of the current number of collaborators in the WG and an estimate of the resources required across the past 2 years.

Working Groups objectives

The list of objectives for each WG has been presented by J.Apostolakis, according to response of the coordinators.

General considerations

  • Concerns have been expressed about the absence in most categories of design goals and Software Process Improvement items.
  • One pressing item for "Analysis" (implementation of interface to HBOOK or alternative for the concrete drivers) is not mentioned in the WG goals.
  • Items for "Generic processes + materials" are missing. M.Verderi presented them verbally.
  • In the items list for "Visualization" there's no reference to development of DTREE and 'picking'. Concerning DTREE, S.Tanaka replied that a first design iteration started and a preliminary implementation of ASCII DTREE is under development; by beginning 2002 an implementation based on GAG/Java and XML is foreseen as well as for 'picking'.
Actions
  • Provide full WG goals by end of April, including OOAD/SPI items and publications, where applicable.
  • Provide written list of items for "Generic processes + materials" (MV).

Process for tracking new requirements

New requirements were presented at the TSB. These include the request of extension of optical processes for X-rays.

General considerations

  • M.Maire expressed the wish from ATLAS to consider the implementation of cuts by logical volume. It has been observed that such functionality affects a design choice and basic philosophy in Geant4 and that precise use-cases should be documented to support such request. If performance issues are involved, these must be demonstrated and verified first.
  • M.G.Pia requested a more rigorous engineering approach to be applied for formulating user requirements. The general URD and WG specific URDs should be generated and regularly maintained.
  • G.Cosmo noticed that the general URD (last version 6.3) needs to be translated into editable format (MS-Word or PDF) from postscript, since the original FrameMaker sources are not available.
Actions
  • Provide a first response to the TSB list by Monday, April 30th for the requirement for X-rays optical processes (M.Maire, P.Gumplinger). A final decision will be taken at the next TSB meeting.
  • By the next Geant4 Workshop, each WG coordinator should come up with a list (on paper or text file) of User Requirements specific to each category. A project to be fullfilled at the Workshop will then be to code specific URDs according to PSS-05 specifications and archive them in the repository.
  • Provide by July 1st an editable prototype of the general URD (G.Cosmo).

Software Process

The current status of the "documents" repository for design sources and documentation has been presented by G.Cosmo.

General considerations

  • Apart from few categories (geometry, EM-lowenergy, hadronic) most design documents are missing !
  • Serious concern has been expressed if up-to-date design documents will not be available by the time of the June's review.
Actions
  • Create missing directories in the repository by April 24th and place existing design documents for processes and materials (G.Cosmo).
  • For each WG coordinator, commit to repository updated UML sources and documents for architectural design (at least), by June 10th.
  • Estimated time needed for traceability: J.Apostolakis will provide the list of responses he received from WG coordinators up to now, by April 30th.

A.O.B.

CHEP 2001 abstracts (by April 30th)

Three general abstracts have been identified for submittal:

  • Status of Geant4 (J.Apostolakis)
  • Software process in Geant4 (G.Cosmo)
  • Design and architecure of collaborating frameworks (A.Pfeiffer)
Other specific ones (if any) submitted should be sent to the Category Coordinators list. It has been suggested that small groups of authors will take care of the papers and sign on behalf of the Geant4 Collaboration.

Next meeting: TSB meeting in May


Tuesday 24 April 2001, GC

Meeting Date