| Routine ID: AAAA001 | |
|---|---|
| Author(s): | Submitted: 01.10.84 |
| Origin: | Revised: 20.04.94 |
As the scale and complexity of High Energy Physics experiments increase, simulation studies require more and more care and become essential to
GEANT is a system of detector description and simulation tools that
help physicists in such studies.
The GEANT system can be obtained from CERN as six
Patchy []/CMZ [] files:
GEANT, GEANG, GEANH, GEANF, GEANE and GEANX.
The program runs everywhere the CERN Program Library has been installed
.
The GEANT and GEANG files contain most of the basic code. The GEANH file contains the code for the hadronic showers simulation from the program GHEISHA []. The GEANF file contains the source of the routines for hadronic showers development from the FLUKA [,,,,,,] program which is interfaced with GEANT as an alternative to GHEISHA to simulate hadronic cascades. The GEANE [] file contains a tracking package to be used, in the context of event reconstruction, for trajectory estimation and error propagation. The GEANX file contains the main program for the interactive version of GEANT (GXINT) and a few examples of application programs which may help users to get started with GEANT.
General information concerning GEANT, for example access to the source code, the list of problems and their proposed corrections, the context of utilisation on the CERN machines, the status of some application programs, the acquisition of documentation, etc., are kept up to date through CERN news and InterNet news group ( cern.lgeant) and an electronic mailing list which is installed on the CERN IBM mainframe (BITnet/EARN node CERNVM). The name of the list is LGEANT (see below how to subscribe).
The first version of GEANT was written in 1974 as a bare framework which initially emphasised tracking of a few particles per event through relatively simple detectors. The system has been developed with some continuity over the years []
New versions may differ from the previous ones. Some of the modifications may lead to backward incompatibilities. The user is therefore invited to read carefully the Patch HISTORY of the current GEANT file where all changes are described in detail.
The development and the maintenance of GEANT are possible only thanks to the devoted and continuous collaboration of physicists around the world who use the program and contribute their feedback to the authors and maintainers at CERN. It is of course impossible to mention all of them, and new names are added frequently to the list of the contributors. The GEANT team wish to thank them all and expresses its hope that they will continue to help us.
GEANT version 3 originated from an idea of René Brun and Andy McPherson in 1982 during the development of the OPAL simulation program. GEANT3 was based on the skeleton of GEANT version 2 code [].
In close collaboration with René and Andy, Pietro Zanarini developed the first versions of the graphics system as well as the early versions of the interactive package initially based on ZCEDEX, then upgraded to KUIP.
Glenn Patrick (RAL) implemented a first version of the electromagnetic processes. Tony Baroncelli (Roma) helped in interfacing GEANT to his hadronic shower package TATINA. Federico Carminati contributed to the interface with GHEISHA, an hadronic shower package developed by Harn Fesefeldt (Aachen).
Francis Bruyant and Michel Maire (LAPP) made substantial contributions to the geometry, tracking and physics parts of GEANT while adapting the system to the L3 environment. Francis has been, for many years, an essential collaborator, testing new ideas for the geometry and hits packages. Michel, together with Elemer Nagy and Vincenzo Innocente, developed the GEANE system.
A very important contribution to GEANT has been made by László Urbán (KFKI Budapest) who has continuously improved the electromagnetic physics package. Lazlo has spent a considerable amount of time in reading the relevant papers in the literature and in making comparisons with experimental results.
René Brun has coordinated the development and the maintenance of GEANT from 1982 until 1991 (versions 3.00 up to 3.14). Federico Carminati coordinated the development of the versions 3.15 and 3.16 between 1991 and 1993. Since January 1994, the responsability for GEANT is in the hands of Simone Giani. Before assuming this responsability, Simone made substantial improvements in the graphics and interactive packages. After he has enhanced the power of the geometry package and the performance of the tracking for a new version of GEANT: in March 1994 the version 3.21 has been released and is the current version of GEANT.
Many people contributed their work or their experience. We have tried to acknowledge their names in the manual pages and we apologise for any omissions.
Special mention should be made here of the following contributions:
S.Banerjee (contribution to the tracking package), R.Jones (contribution to the simulation of electromagnetic processes), K.Lassila-Perini (interface with FLUKA and MICAP), G.Lynch (contribution to the multiple scattering algorithms), E.Tchernyaev (original code for hidden-line removal graphics), J.Salt (original interface to the GC package).
S. Ravndal did a complete revision and update of the full documentation for the release of GEANT version 3.21.
Special thanks should go to the authors of the packages interfaced with GEANT, and in particular to Harn Fesefeldt ( GHEISHA) and Alfredo Ferrari ( FLUKA see later). Their patience in explaining the internals of their code, their experience and their collaborative and open attitude have been instrumental.
Another special thanks goes to Mike Metcalf, who helped to improve the English and the structure of the manual.
Any reader who is not familiar with GEANT should first have a glance at the notes numbered 001 to 009 in each section of this manual.
Despite our efforts, the documentation is still incomplete and far from perfect. We accept full responsibility for its present status.
Finally, we express our thanks to Michel Goossens for translating the SCRIPT/SGML source of the original GEANT manual into LaTeX.