LSST Data Management Facilities
The data management system begins at the data acquisition interface between the camera and telescope subsystems and flows through to the data products accessed by end users. On the way, it moves through three types of managed facilities supporting data management, as well as end user sites that may conduct science using LSST data or pipeline resources on their own computing infrastructure.
The Mountain/Base Facility is composed of the mountaintop telescope site, where data acquisition must interface to the other LSST subsystems, and the "base facility" site, where rapid-turnaround processing will occur for data quality assessment and near real-time alerts.
The Archive Center is a super-computing class data center with high reliability and availability. This is where the data will undergo complete processing and re-processing and permanent storage. It is also the main repository feeding the distribution of LSST data to the community.
One or more LSST Data Center sites for broad user access are envisioned, according to a tiered access model where the tiers define the capacity and response available. These centers provide replication of all or a subset of the LSST data and are chosen in order to optimize community access. They provide Virtual Observatory interfaces to the LSST data products.
