<title>Open environment for image processing and software development</title>

Abstract

The main goal of the Khoros software project is to create and provide an integrated software development environment for information processing and data visualization. The Khoros software system is now being used as a foundation to improve productivity and promote software reuse in a wide variety of application domain. A powerful feature of the Khoros system is the high-level, abstract visual language that can be employed to significantly boost the productivity of the researcher. Central to the Khoros system is the need for a consistent yet flexible user interface development system that provides cohesiveness to the vast number of programs that make up the Khoros system. Automated tools assist in maintenance as well as development of programs. The software structure that embodies this system provides for extensibility and portability, and allows for easy tailoring to target specific application domains and processing environments. First, an overview of the Khoros software environment is given. Then this paper presents the abstract applications programmer interface, API, the data services that are provided in Khoros to support it, and the Khoros visualization and image file format. The authors contend that Khoros is an excellent environment for the exploration and implementation of imaging standards.