A COM-based toolkit for real time visualization

Abstract

Collaborative software development in different languages is not unusual, but leads to minor resource utilization during collaboration as a result of porting or reprogramming needs. Additionally in cooperative projects, frequently legal and market economic issues prohibit an exchange of source code between the project partners. Combining modules from different languages is possible using the Component Object Model (COM). Additionally COM offers an efficient way to combine modules from several development teams. To solve the common issues of collaborative software development and to fulfil the needs of a real time visualization toolkit, “RTVCOM” was designed and realized. To demonstrate the capability of this approach an example client was developed that combines COM components written in OpenCL C, OpenGLSL, C++ and C#. It that processes 3D+t ultrasound data at 45.2 MB/s reconstructs the associated volume data and visualizes them in real time. The visualization is fully interactive, and different pre- and post-processing filters can be applied.