Hardware/software requirements

Hardware requirements in broad outline:

• Hard disk: the maximum size of the pixel archive is estimated as follows: a single WFCAM science frame is 4 devices $\times$ $2048\times2048$ pixels $\times2\times2$ interlaced $\times4$ bytes per pixel $=270$ Mbyte. For a 7 yr lifetime, 75% UKIRT time devoted to WFCAM we have to deal with 2000 nights of science data. Assuming $\sim200$ frames per night (an average of one every 3 mins over a 10hr night) then the final pixel archive is $\sim100$ Tbyte in size. 10 Tbytes up-front will be more than adequate initially, then adding $\sim10$ Tbyte per year is a possibility. All other data (derived from pixels or elsewhere) will be $<10$% the size of the pixel archive.
• the backup or redundant storage for the above will be based in Cambridge as part of the basic pipeline
• CPUs: single-node server or Beowulf cluster
• network connectivity: efficient communication requires at least 100 Mbit/s capability²

Software requirement in broad outline:

• SX and associated database management system (currently Objectivity but this may well change over the next couple of years)
• database software for housekeeping information
• multi-node/user licences (as appropriate) for any commercial software
• parallelisation software for Beowulf, if required
• GUI software home-grown by inhouse programmer(s)
• remote server interface for network-based browsers