The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) is a 39 meters optical telescope under construction at an altitude of about 3000m in the Chilean Atacama desert. The optical design is based on a novel five-mirror scheme and incorporates adaptive optics mirrors. The primary mirror consists of 798 segments, each 1.4 meters wide[1]. The control of this telescope and of the instruments that will be mounted on it is very challenging, because of its size, the number of sensors and actuators, the computing performance required for the phasing of the primary mirror, the adaptive optics and the correlation between all the elements in the optical path. In this paper we describe the control system architecture, emerging from scientific and technical requirements. We also describe how the procurement strategy (centered on industrial contracts at subsystem level) affects the definition of the architecture and the technological choices. We first introduce the global architecture of the system, with Local Control Systems and a Supervisory Control layer. The Local Control Systems is astronomy-agnostic and isolate the control of the subsystems procured through industrial contracts. The Supervisory Control layer is instead responsible for coordinating the operation of the different subsystems to realize the observation cases identified for the operation of the telescope. The control systems of the instruments interface with the telescope using a well-defined and standardized interface. To facilitate the work of the Consortia responsible for the construction of the instruments, we provide an Instrumentation Control Software Framework. This will ensure uniformity in the design of the control systems across instruments, making maintenance easier. This approach was successfully adopted for the instrumentation of the Very Large Telescope facility. We will analyze the process that was followed for defining the architecture from the requirements and use cases and to produce a design that addresses the technical challenges.
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