I04 XRC Testing: Stable But Needs Key Merges

Welcome to our update on the I04 XRC testing, focusing on developments leading up to December 2025. It's been a period of significant progress, and while we're pleased to report a relatively stable system for now, there are a few crucial steps remaining to ensure optimal performance. Our primary goal has been to refine the user experience and address some persistent issues within the mx-bluesky framework. This discussion aims to provide a clear overview of the current status, highlight key fixes, and outline the path forward.

Current Status and Key Fixes

One of the most persistent issues we've tackled involves the expeye component, specifically its failure to populate the sample ID in data collection. This isn't an isolated problem with the I04 XRC but rather a more general challenge we've observed within the mx-bluesky ecosystem. Ensuring accurate and automatic sample ID population is critical for efficient data management and analysis, and we've been actively working on solutions to rectify this. The implications of this bug can lead to significant manual effort in data annotation, increasing the potential for errors and slowing down the research workflow. Our team has dedicated considerable time to diagnosing the root cause and implementing robust fixes. The goal is to make this process seamless, allowing researchers to focus on their experiments rather than data logging intricacies. The stability of the expeye component is paramount for the overall usability of the I04 XRC, and we are committed to resolving this at the earliest opportunity.

Furthermore, we had to implement a cherry-pick for a specific pull request: https://github.com/DiamondLightSource/dodal/pull/1737. This was a necessary step because the pull request had not yet been merged into the main branch. Cherry-picking allows us to integrate specific code changes without merging the entire branch, which can be beneficial when dealing with dependencies or ongoing development. While we strive for a streamlined merging process, situations like these require a more targeted approach to ensure that critical functionalities are available in our testing environment. The specific changes in this PR are vital for enhancing the performance and reliability of our systems, and their absence would have hindered our progress. We understand that unmerged pull requests can sometimes cause delays, and we are working closely with the relevant teams to expedite the merging process for this particular fix and others that may arise.

Another significant challenge we've overcome pertains to a known issue where the GDA (General Data Acquisition) interface would hang, leaving buttons grayed out. This typically occurred when an exception was raised within a bluesky plan. Traditionally, such exceptions would be handled using a try/except block. However, we discovered that Java exceptions were not being consistently caught by the Jython except block. To address this, we had to adopt a different strategy: unhanging GDA within a try/finally block. This approach ensures that the cleanup and state restoration logic is executed regardless of whether an exception occurs, preventing the interface from becoming unresponsive. This fix is crucial for maintaining a smooth and uninterrupted user experience, as a hanging interface can disrupt experiments and lead to frustration. The robustness of the GDA interface is fundamental to the successful operation of the I04 XRC, and this adjustment significantly improves its reliability under error conditions.

Looking Ahead: Merging and Refinement

While the current state of the I04 XRC testing is relatively stable, there are still a couple of key tasks that need our attention to reach a fully optimized operational status. The most pressing is the merging of the GDA side of the changes. This involves integrating the finalized code and configurations from the GDA development team into our main operational branch. Ensuring seamless integration between the different software components is vital for the overall performance and stability of the beamline. Once this merge is complete, we anticipate a more unified and robust system. We are actively communicating with the GDA team to schedule and execute this merge efficiently.

Concurrently, we need to sort out the expeye changes that we discussed earlier. This includes finalizing the implementation and testing of the fixes related to sample ID population. Our aim is to have this component functioning flawlessly, providing accurate and automatic data logging for all users. The refinement of the expeye component is essential for enhancing the efficiency of data handling and reducing the potential for manual errors. We are dedicated to thorough testing to ensure that these changes are robust and do not introduce any unintended side effects.

Conclusion and Next Steps

In summary, the I04 XRC testing has reached a commendable level of stability. We have successfully implemented critical fixes for issues concerning expeye sample ID population and GDA interface hangs. The cherry-picking of essential code from the dodal repository has also bolstered our system's reliability. However, the path to full operational readiness requires the successful merging of the GDA changes and the finalization of the expeye component refinements. We are confident that addressing these final points will significantly enhance the user experience and data integrity for all experiments conducted at the I04 XRC. We appreciate the patience and cooperation of all users during this development phase. Please feel free to reach out with any questions or feedback.

For more information on bluesky and its applications in experimental control, you can refer to the official bluesky documentation: https://blueskyproject.io/

Further details on the Diamond Light Source can be found on their official website: https://www.diamond.ac.uk/