The ESRF accelerator complex (the Machine) is made up of three parts:
linear accelerator (100MeLINAC), booster synchrotron (100MeV-6GeV), storage ring (6GeV).

The ESRF developed in the year 90's a control system, named TACO, for these accelerators. TACO has since been extended to other uses, but the accelerator control system or Machine Control System (MCS) remains the largest application.
The MCS controls over 9000 devices through more than 150 hosts computers ( VME crates ,UNIX machines, linux PCs, Windows PCs) linked by Ethernet networks.
The devices include: vacuum equipment, beam diagnostics, radio frequency systems, beam steering, linac and booster control and leveling surveying.
The MCS interconnects some thirty beamlines, which also use the TACO control system, to read machine data and to control insertion devices.

since 2000's a new version of this control system (TANGO) based on CORBA is being developped in colaboration between three institutes: Elettra, Soleil and ESRF.