Accelerating Control Systems with GitOps: A Path to Automation and Reliability

TL;DR

This paper discusses how GitOps can modernize control systems by enabling automation, version control, and reliability, with applications in scientific facilities and accelerator infrastructure.

Contribution

It demonstrates the application of GitOps, containerization, and modern data pipelines to control system modernization in scientific and accelerator facilities.

Findings

GitOps enables fully automated control system management.

Containerization improves deployment consistency and scalability.

Integration of AI/ML enhances control system capabilities.

Abstract

GitOps is a foundational approach for modernizing infrastructure by leveraging Git as the single source of truth for declarative configurations. The poster explores how GitOps transforms traditional control system infrastructure, services and applications by enabling fully automated, auditable, and version-controlled infrastructure management. Cloud-native and containerized environments are shifting the ecosystem not only in the IT industry but also within the computational science field, as is the case of CERN [1] and Diamond Light Source [2] among other Accelerator/Science facilities which are slowly shifting towards modern software and infrastructure paradigms. The ACORN project, which aims to modernize Fermilab's control system infrastructure and software is implementing proven best-practices and cutting-edge technology standards including GitOps, containerization, infrastructure as code and modern data pipelines for control system data acquisition and the inclusion of AI/ML in our accelerator complex.