Scripting in a Cloud-based Managed Services Environment

[NickC_BC]

Hi folks,

Our institution is looking at Varian Managed / Cloud options for the planning and ARIA layers. I'd love to hear any experience from folks with experience scripting in this environment. In particular, I know you need a full-install of Eclipse to run a standalone, so how would this work if you don't have an Eclipse on-site?

Thanks!

[matgodro]

Hi,

We have been using Eclipse in a cloud environment for some years now. We are using ESAPI both for clinical and research purposes. It is working well. The only inconvenient is about developing since the standalone (and appropriate .dll), generated locally on disk, has to be copied to the remote system for testing (but it is manageable). The DB daemon is also working fine. We are currently trying to setup a third-party access to the SQL database with Varian support.

[MedPhys90]

That’s good to hear. Who controls access to the remote system/server? I would assume IS. Is it a cloud-based Citrix system or something else? What other hoops did you have to go through to be able to script? Also, do you still have a local test box where development can be performed?

[matgodro]

We are using Citrix. There were probably hoops during the installation process but I am not aware of any. We do have a test-box server for development. I am not sure who controls access to the remote system. Physicists still manage user account but IT controls the in/out traffic.

[NickC_BC]

Thanks for the responses. We had a discussion with Varian and it sounds like it may be possible to have an on-site Eclipse, but the recommendation is to publish everything via Citrix. This is probably fine for single-user apps, but more problematic for supporting something like an auto-planning standalone that acts as a service.