System for network communication of image information between imaging ...

(54) SYSTEM FOR NETWORK

COMMUNICATION OF IMAGE
INFORMATION BETWEEN IMAGING
DEVICES ACCORDING TO MULTIPLE
PROTOCOLS

(75) Inventors: Kent J. Sieffert, Minneapolis; Andrew R. Ihlenfeldt, Saint Paul, both of MN (US)

(73) Assignee: Eastman Kodak Company, Rochester, NY (US)

( * ) Notice: This patent issued on a continued prosecution application filed under 37 CFR 1.53(d), and is subject to the twenty year patent term provisions of 35 U.S.C. 154(a)(2).

Subject to any disclaimer, the term of this patent is extended or adjusted under 35 U.S.C. 154(b) by 0 days.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

(21) Appl. No.: 08/720,882

(22) Filed: Oct. 4, 1996

Related U.S. Application Data

(63) Continuation-in-part of application No. 08/343,184, filed on Nov. 22, 1994, now Pat. No. 5,630,101.

(51) Int. C I. G06F 15/00

(52) U.S. CI 709/321; 710/11; 709/229

(58) Field of Search 709/229, 246,

709/321; 710/105, 106, 62, 64, 65, 73,

11

(56) References Cited

U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS

4,604,686 8/1986 Reiter et al 395/500.46

A medical imaging system for communicating image information between a plurality of different medical imaging modalities having different input protocols and a plurality of different laser imagers having different output protocols takes advantage of a reusable, object-oriented software architecture having a plurality of functionally independent components. The individual components can be configured in a communication pipeline to communicate image information between a medical imaging modality and a laser imager according to desired protocols in a networked manner. Each component can be interchanged with a differently configured component to facilitate communication of image information according to a different protocol, thereby reconfiguring the pipeline to achieve significant flexibility. The software architecture is scalable to produce a plurality of communication pipelines, each of which can be configured according to desired protocols. Thus, the system can support a different protocol by either swapping components to reconfigure a single communication pipeline, or by simply selecting an alternative among a plurality of differently configured communication pipelines in the scalable architecture. The software architecture is equipped with a network executive component designed to configure one or more communication pipelines for network communication.

15 Claims, 5 Drawing Sheets

U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS

5,303,342 4/1994 Edge 345/526

5,329,431 7/1994 Taylor et al 362/85

5,339,413 8/1994 Koval et al 709/300

5,392,393 2/1995 Deering 345/505

5,410,675 4/1995 Shreve et al 710/65

5,432,906 7/1995 Newman et al 345/501

5,457,784 10/1995 Wells et al 710/9

5,493,635 2/1996 Brindle et al 395/114

5,502,726 3/1996 Fischer 370/392

5,630,101 * 5/1997 Sieffert 709/246

5,647,056 * 7/1997 Barrett et al 709/229

* cited by examiner