The first step of the VSAT data processing is done centrally by DELPHI in the program DELANA [2], of which the VSAT part is called LUMANA. The output stream of this program ends up on the disk WSDED2$DKA200:[VSAT.DATA], which has the size of 4 GB. DELANA creates one output file for each DELPHI cassette of data that has been written. The size of each such file requires about 5 Mega Byte of disk space. In order to have the data available on disk it is therefore necessary to compress this data as fast as possible.
The VSAT collaboration has created a program called COMPACT, that compresses all the all the DELANA files within a fill to one single FX file in ZEBRA format[1]. The central processing of the raw data cassettes do not execute synchronously, as they use several machines for this task. It could therefore happen that not all cassettes in a given fill have been processed by DELANA at the launch of COMPACT. It should therefore not be started until two days after the last DELANA output file in a given fill has been created(unless all cassettes already have been received).
Once a DELANA file has been processed by COMPACT it should be moved to another location in order not to mix it up with the unprocessed files. It would also be desirable that this location is split up into two areas - One area for fills with no missing cassettes, and one for fills that have one or more cassettes missing. New versions of the DELANA program are created several times during the year, with new versions of all the data files. In order to save disk space it is desirable that only the latest DELANA version of a FX-file is kept on the disk.
All this compression and checking of missing cassettes and DELANA version numbers should not be the headache of the VSAT shifter. This should be done automatically without any interaction from the person in question. Furthermore an output should be generated whenever a fill was processed and how many cassettes that were missing.