Control and monitoring of the DOe detector

The DOe experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider is currently studying proton-antiproton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 1.8 TeV. The data-acquisition system for the experiment was designed with two independent pathways for communication between the front-end computers, which interface with the detector electronics, and the host-level computers, where the event data is logged and where the experiment is monitored and controlled. The event data path employs multiple, high-bandwidth, unidirectional busses while the control path, which uses standard local area network components, handles all control, configuration setting, alarm, and monitoring communications. This paper discusses the software components associated with the control communication path, with emphasis upon the design philosophy, user interface, database, and networking issues. ((orig.))